A Stag in an Ill-Fitting Coat
by EscapismReigns
Summary: Ten years have passed, and Gendry has done his best with a life he had never imagined possible for a bastard. But when he is saved by Arya Stark in the midst of an ironborn uprising, Gendry abandons everything in hopes of rekindling a love he had thought gone. True to his luck, though, what he expected and what he gets are two very different things.
1. Chapter 1

It was only when he was in the midst of battle, slipping and sliding across the deck of a Redwyne ship, that he found out where his future was.

It was currently covered in blood, slicing ironborn throats left, right, and fucking centre, and didn't look particularly welcome to company – but ah, well, such is the life of a Flea Bottom bastard.

When King Bran had asked him to lead Crown and Stormlands soldiers west to defend the Riverlands and the Westerlands from ironborn raiders, Gendry was feeling downright mutinous. The whole point of being a Lord Paramount was that he emdidn't/em have to fight amongst the shit and piss anymore.

Those were his thoughts riding out in the slopping rain. The next weeks were spent in rough leathers that smelt constantly of damp, seeing as the rain had politely followed them across Westeros. And those were particularly his thoughts when he had to listen to Lord Bronn Blackwater wax poetic about whichever King's Landing brothel he had been so cruelly ripped away from.

Even Pod seemed a bit weary of it, after weeks travelled.

Bronn had married a cousin to the late Tyrells, some Redwyne maid – Gendry could never remember these godscurst names – and they both seemed quite content to let her run things in the Reach while he did his duties in King's Landing as Master of Coin and errant whoremonger. There were a few children though, from their brief reunions, so Gendry guessed the arrangement must be working.

Tyrion insisted that an affinity for brothels had always accompanied the role of Master of Coin, but Gendry was sceptical. He tried to do his duty as Lord of Storm's End first, and Master of War second, and let that be the end of it.

Except it wasn't, because Gendry could never be idle while his men fought for him, so his duty as both had apparently led him here, fighting once more amongst the piss and shit.

It had been a rough morning.

Their soldiers had arrived to the colossal camp on the outskirts of Lannisport in the early hours, campfires low and drowning in rain. The only light came from the slightest sliver of sunlight on a horizon choked with black clouds, and fertile grounds had long since been trampled to thick mud in the rain. With each tired step his warhorse made, Gendry could hear the slurp of mud and the squeak of his saddle.

"Oi, lad." Bronn leant over to nudge him in his saddle. "The fancy sods and good ale is that a'ways, in the fortress at the city gates. Maybe if you get there quick enough you can avoid the fancy sods."

With his wisdom now bestowed, Bronn left Gendry and Pod staring blearily after him as he made his way whistling to the city gates in the distance, House Lannister banners displayed over its walls. Next to the golden lion was House Blackwater of Highgarden's black sword on a field of green, King Bran's grey raven on a field of white, and Gendry's own stag.

Gendry grimaced to Pod, who as Commander of the Crown's forces had as much authority as he. "Should we get the men set up before we get comfortable?"

At that moment, Ser Willas Caswell of the Kingsguard addressed them, "Lord Baratheon, Ser Podrick, I believe I can take care of settling our soldiers within the camp, if it pleases you."

Arse-kisser. Pod looked at Gendry, who shrugged. Pod clicked his tongue but responded, "We would be grateful, Ser Willas. I'll have one of Lord Baratheon's knights aid you."

With that, Gendry motioned to Ser Ormund Cafferen, a stocky man with a paunch and a sharp look to his eye. Cafferen had quickly become one of Gendry's chief advisors when he first arrived in Storm's End, and had rarely left Gendry's side since.

"Ormund, you'll aid Ser Willas here with settling our soldiers." Gendry cast an appraising eye back over the irritable, soaked Baratheon and Crown men, before turning back to Ormund, "And I want no fights before the battle. First man that does so is shovelling new latrines for however long these godscurst ironborn keep up their reaving."

Ormund gave a small smile, no doubt at the thought of inflicting latrine duty, "Yes, my lord."

"And Cafferen? Take the Trant lad with you." Gendry's squire, Duncan Trant, woke from his saddle at the mention of his name. After a confused glance around, and Ormund's figure retreating into the distance, he dismounted clumsily and scuttled after the knight.

Pod grunted, "You're going to be the death of the poor lad."

Gendry shrugged, "Either that or he might turn out to be a good knight." The very idea of having a squire, and that the noble families of the Stormlands had bickered over who was to be his squire as if it were a grand honour, continued to disturb Gendry.

With that matter sorted, Gendry and Pod set off for the city wall with a small retinue of soldiers. Once inside Lannisport, they were escorted to a small stone hall within the fortress, just big enough for a warm hearth and a large group of lords planning the realm's defence.

Personally, Gendry preferred the warm hearth, but that was just him.

When he and Pod walked through the doors, all but Bronn stood to welcome them. Gendry thanked the Seven for introductions, as he only recognised perhaps one or two of these highborns.

Genna Lannister stood to one side, boxed in by her nephew, Martyn Lannister, her son, Lyonel Frey, and her grandson, Willem Frey. Gendry knew that aside from a smattering of daughters and bastards, they were all that remained of House Lannister's main line. Next to them was a Lannister cousin, Daven, who had inherited their blond hair but evidently not their good looks. The man seemingly out of place beside them with the sunken eyes and tired smile was Lord Addam Marbrand of Ashenmark.

Gendry knew of them only by Tyrion's constant complaints, and he knew that every so often, another Lannister daughter would be sent by them to King's Landing in an attempt to catch the Lord Hand's eye. Gendry could sympathise, the lords of the Stormlands liked to play similar games. And like Gendry, Tyrion wouldn't be able to hold out much longer before marrying.

Every lord needed an heir, after all.

Reluctantly surrounding Bronn on the other side of the table was his good-father, Lord Paxter Redwyne, as well as Ser Baelor Hightower and a handful of other Reach lords that Gendry forgot as soon as they were introduced.

It had been one of the smarter moves Tyrion had made in those initial years after Bran's ascension, annulling Bronn's marriage to Lollys Stokeworth and brokering it to Paxter Redwyne's daughter instead. As the girl's mother was a Tyrell, it gave a sense of legitimacy and stability to Bronn's rule over Highgarden and the Reach that wouldn't have been there else-wise.

Another thing that struck him was how old all the Reach lords were. In almost all of Westeros, a good deal of highborns of the older generations had died in the many coups, conflicts, or the cold that the last winter had brought. They were lucky, in the Reach.

And lastly, there were several lords of the Crownlands and the Stormlands that were sent ahead with the first contingent of soldiers. They bowed deeply toward Gendry and Pod, and had banded together near the head of the table, where two seats had been left.

The most prominent of the storm lords present were Ser Aemon Estermont, Lord Arstan Selmy, and Ser Balon Swann. Ser Aemon was the thick-browed, middle-aged heir to Greenstone and Gendry's distant cousin. Their ties of kinship had made it easy for Aemon to install himself as one of Gendry's advisors at Storm's End and King's Landing, as twice as difficult to remove – not that Gendry had bothered trying.

Lord Arstan was much more amiable, however was given to strong flatulence, and so wasn't often brought to council unless the situation was dire. These two men were amongst the many that threw their daughters at Gendry, and their sons at Mya in hopes to land a Baratheon marriage.

Ser Balon Swann, while of the Stormlands, was one of Pod's sworn brothers – the only to survive the fall of King's Landing. Bran sending three Kingsguard alongside Gendry to aide him with the ironborn seemed a little excessive, but Balon seemed decent and Gendry was glad of it.

The only lord of the Crownlands present was Lord Olyvar Rosby, a tall but slightly anxious looking man only a few years older than Gendry. Gendry knew him as a steadfast ally of King Bran, and he was always a welcome addition to the King's Landing court.

Yet there was one face Gendry hadn't put a name to yet. Peering closer, he realised he recognised the house colours, and took a sharp breath.

Bemused, Genna Lannister gestured to the young girl, "Ah, yes. This is Lyra Mormont of Bear Island. She arrived just yesterday eve with a band of Northmen. She brings a letter informing us that the North has likewise been attacked by ironborn across their western coasts, and that with the King's permission, the Stark Queen will be sending support to aid us, her brother, and her uncle, Lord Edmure Tully."

Genna picked up letter from the table and waved it, "We just received a raven from the King, confirming this."

"The little queen is apparently so poor that she sends children to do her work." Paxter Redwyne jeered. Baelor Hightower winced, evidently embarrassed of the balding Arbour lord.

The girl eyed him evilly, "I have seventeen years, Lord Redwyne, a woman grown. And it is a great honour to my house that I was chosen to serve my Queen, and to stand as her representative until the North arrives."

Gendry interrupted Redwyne's sneering reply by stepping forwards and bowing shortly to the girl. Meeting her eyes, he said, "Both Ser Podrick and myself served alongside your older sister, Lyanna Giantsbane, at Winterfell. It is an honour."

Beside him, Pod bowed as well, "If you are anything like your sister, my lady, it will help us greatly to have your council."

Slightly appeased, the girl settled and nodded to them both, eyes lingering on Gendry with a knowledge he couldn't understand. After sending another poisonous look toward the Reach lord, she sat down in a chair that had been quickly dragged to the table as boldly as if it were a throne.

Bronn cleared his throat, "So, if we are done with all the fancy posturing, can we get a _fuckin'_ move on?" Seemingly oblivious to the disgusted looks he was receiving, Bronn poured himself another cup of wine.

Pod smirked at Gendry, who smirked back. He had grown to deeply appreciate Bronn after their many years on the Small Council together; a fresh sea breeze compared to the dank and overly-perfumed air of the Westerosi lords. They both took their seats near the head of the table, and everyone sat.

As Master of War and Tyrion's representative as Lord Hand, Gendry wearily realised it would be up to him to lead these discussions. Looking around the table, Gendry waved an encouraging hand, "So what do we know of the enemy's current numbers and their positions?"

Lyonel Frey begun rising, but Olyvar rose quicker. After sharing what Gendry could only imagine were hateful glares, Olyvar turned to Gendry, "My lord, the Lannisport fleet, numbering some twenty ships, have been presumably destroyed or captured by the ironborn. Without a defence in place, reaving and raiding grows closer to Lannisport every day. The Banefort, the Crag, and the Fair Isles have been taken, while we have reports that currently Kayce is under attack. Our scouts suggest the fleet numbers some one hundred and ten longships of varying size. Many have one hundred oars."

Alarm coursed through Gendry, and he sat back in his seat, "This is much worse than we were led to believe, then. Kayce is barely a day's ride west of Lannisport." Another thought fluttered across his mind, "At least we know that these are no pirates."

"No," Genna Lannister agreed, "If we do not succeed in crushing the Iron Fleet, it could mean that Asha Greyjoy will fully commit herself to a rebellion rather than just supporting men in the shadows."

Meeting her eyes, Gendry asked the Lannister matriarch, "Besides your destroyed ships, how big of an army can you field?"

Genna nodded, "We have assurances that the last of some twenty thousand men will arrive here a day, as you saw by the fields outside Lannisport. They have with them enough supplies to last several months or at least until Reach supply trains arrive."

Gendry replied, mind churning, "We have brought ten-to-fifteen thousand Stormlands and Crown soldiers. Combined that should be more than enough to lay siege to the mainland castles they have taken, and rip them out."

Genna smiled, a truly fearsome thing, "I look forward to it, my lord."

Gendry turned to the Mormont girl, "What can we expect from Winterfell."

She stood immediately to attention, shoulders broad and sturdy, "Eight thousand men will be here in three weeks, Lord Baratheon, and we have sent down what sea vessels we can spare to attack from the north."

The men would be too late, and the ships would be mostly trading vessels, and therefore not much use. Gendry heard titters from the Lannisters, much to his dismay, but still replied gratefully with, "Thank you, Lady Mormont."

The situation was looking more and more severe.

Finally, "As for other ships, Lord Blackwater, what can we expect from the Reach?"

Bronn glared at Paxter Redwyne, who stood, "My Lord, we are sending one-third of the Redwyne warship fleet to Lannisport, approximately sixty galleys, while several trains of rations and supplies are being sent overland, and are expected to be here within the fortnight."

Gods be good, only _sixty_? They would be massacred. Seething, Gendry found his voice, and hissed, "And why is it that only one-third of the Redwyne fleet is arriving?"

"Yes, good-father," Bronn said caustically, "Tell them why."

Paxter Redwyne shuffled nervously from one foot to the other, and blustered, "Well, quite frankly my lord, we need to maintain defence for the Reach. We lost the Shield Islands and almost the Arbour to Euron Greyjoy during Cersei's reign. It cannot happen again."

Pod interjected, "And with all the ironborn ships currently occupied here, you don't think you could have defended your seat with less than one hundred and thirty ships?"

The mocking undertone to Pod's voice wasn't one that Gendry remembered from when they first met. Like so many other things, it was something acquired from years spent in King's Landing. At least the Lannisters seemed to be enjoying the show, a smile playing over Genna Lannister's face as she watched Paxter Redwyne be humiliated.

Ser Baelor Hightower spoke, "My lords...Lord Blackwater, Lord Redwyne and myself have reassessed the situation, and are sending a further seventy war vessels, which can be here within the month."

"A _month?!_" Genna Lannister cried, "Every _day_ we wait is another chance that the fleet will continue raiding the western coasts, that they will gain more ironborn followers, or that they will grow bold enough to attack Lannisport itself. We cannot afford to wait more than a sennight, lest we lose the West!"

"Perhaps we could have afforded to wait the month if your Frey son hadn't foolishly sent your whole fleet after the godscurst ironborn!" Baelor shouted back, "The Lannisport fleet had only been built to twenty war vessels when he gave the order for green boys to go to the slaughter!"

"_Silence!_"

The room went quiet as the grave, and Gendry suddenly felt weary. Sighing after his outburst, Gendry asserted, "We're never going to succeed with these odds if we are at each other's throats. We'll take several hours break and return. You're all dismissed."

Gendry watched as the lords and ladies rose and left. Bronn held back, waiting until everyone had left before speaking, "I told that bastard to send three-quarters of the fleet."

Gendry brows knitted, "What?"

Bronn gazed at him and Pod, eyes dark, "I told that Redwyne bastard to only leave a skeleton defence for the Arbour, and yet he has retained over a hundred ships."

Both Pod and Gendry were silent – they both knew what it meant when men started disobeying their overlords.

Bronn sighed, "After we get through this shit fight, I'm going to have to return to Highgarden and re-establish myself. I never thought that getting a castle would come with so much cunt baggage."

"Didn't we all?" Gendry snorted.

All sharp edges, Bronn grinned, "Who knows, maybe I'll just go impregnate his daughter again. That'll show the prissy bastard." Almost thoughtfully, he continued, "She always does have such a sweet smile for me when she comes."

With that, he strode out, leaving Gendry once more to stew in anger.

Jaw clenching, Gendry muttered to Pod, still seated beside him, "I've heard about these new kraken warships, Pod. We have little chance of winning this without further support, and yet if we don't do something soon we'll risk a full-blown rebellion."

Pod tapped the table, not meeting his eyes, "'Tis a difficult position. I suggest going ahead with regaining the mainland holds, but we might have to accept losing the Fair Isles. Even with a defensive position, there's no telling if the Redwyne fleet will hold against the Iron Fleet."

"The Westerlands lords will despise us either way."

Pod gave a humourless chuckle, "You don't have to tell me that, House Payne is a Westerlands family, remember?"

As they left the room gladly, Gendry noticed Olyvar Rosby talking to one of his knights. Nodding for Pod to go ahead without him, Gendry walked over to the lord. He saw Gendry approach, and dismissed the other man.

"I couldn't help but notice the looks the Freys were giving you...what have you done to them, and can I help?" Gendry asked jokingly.

Olyvar looked taken aback, then confused. Finally good-humoured realisation came to his face, "They see me as a blood traitor, my lord. You were solidifying your claim to Storm's End when I became lord of Rosby, so I don't expect you to remember. I was originally of House Frey, Lord Walder Frey's fourth son to Bethany Rosby, and a squire to Robb Stark. After the Red Wedding I fled to my great-uncle's castle to escape my traitorous family."

Gendry's brows shot up, but Olyvar was staring out with an expression of true hate to the field where a Frey banner was just visible, "Robb was good friend and a better man. I will never forgive them for what they did to him, and I have made sure no house in the Crownlands will ever trade with them. When I heard Robb's sister had slaughtered them all at a feast, my father included, I drank more wine than I ever had in my life."

"Then I am glad for your great-uncle." Gendry's gut clenched uncomfortably, and he changed the subject, "That would make your sister Roslin Tully, Lady of Riverrun, right?"

Olyvar smiled, "Aye. She, too, pretends that she were never a Frey. I suppose once she popped out several heirs, people like to let her believe they forget. She and that idiot, Edmure, trust me to represent their interests here."

"Bran told me that none of the Riverlands lords could be here, but gave no reason as to why."

Olyvar rolled his eyes, "The new lord of Harrenhal died without heirs. The river lords are currently chomping at the bit for it, and old rivalries and conflicts have arisen and are threatening to spill out. They're too busy to care about Iron Islanders when the Crown and the Lannisters are taking care of the problem for them, although some have sent men to fight with Blackwater forces."

Gendry's face pinched, "What of the river lords that hold lands on the western coast?"

Olyvar shrugged, "House Seaguard hasn't reported anything. Either they've fled, are dead, or are holding the ironborn off somehow. North and south are the Twins and Oldstones, respectively. The ironborn aren't stupid enough to try and attack the Twins with a Tully garrison there, and Oldstones is a ruin."

Once again Gendry sighed. It seemed like all he had been doing recently. With a pat on Olyvar's shoulder, he nodded to him and continued on his way. He had much to think about.

Five days later, Gendry was onboard one of the sixty Redwyne vessels to the southern side of the Feastfires peninsula, and regretting the decision to ever come west.

Pod had left two days ago, heading some twenty-five thousand men first to Kayce, then north to dismantle ironborn control. It left roughly ten thousand men here to defend the land around Lannisport, and Gendry was pleasantly surprised to find the Redwyne fleet consisting of colossal war galleys.

They had packed as many soldiers onto the galleys as possible. The odds were as good as he could make them.

"We've just had a raven from Lannisport, my lord," said Ormund beside him, "The whole Iron Fleet is about to round the peninsula."

Gendry took a steadying breath, "Let the men know, then."

Beside him, Duncan was fidgeting with his plate-armour. Gendry swatted his hand, "Face forward, shoulders back, and don't fidget. It makes you more nervous. Keep your head about you, and you'll be fine, lad."

The green lad's wide eyes met his, "Yes, my lord."

Seven, was he ever truly once that young?

When Gendry turned back, he found Ser Balon looking at him with a queer smile, "You make a good teacher to the lad, my lord. And by the Seven, you remind me of Robert Baratheon on his better days."

Gendry puffed, "I'm a ghost for many people, Balon. Hopefully I have a better fate than my predecessors."

And then, the horns rang out. The pealing sound echoed over the water, and shivers rushed their way down Gendry's spine.

"Here they fucking come." He heard Balon mutter.

One ship soon became three, then nine, and before long dozens were racing down the peninsula. The longships leading the vanguard were giants, easily holding a hundred oars. The fronts were carved into rams made for piercing hulls.

Gendry felt sick, "Ready the archers and the fire barrels, make sure the ships are always facing toward the ironborn, and brace. The impact will be greater if we are moving, so don't raise the sails under any circumstances. Let the captains know."

One of the men nodded, and raced off.

Moments before the ships came into the archer's range, Gendry looked to the sky. It was such a faultless blue, the sound of gulls in the distance and the smell of salt heavy in the air. Nothing had been wrong with the day, yet soon the sky would soon be clogged with smoke, the sounds of screams and the smell of blood replacing paradise.

Gendry sighed, and held tighter onto his warhammer.

"ARCHERS!" The scream came from the top deck, and the men nocked their arrows from barrels placed on every ship. There were other barrels to use if things became desperate, but Gendry was reluctant to even touch them. They held a fire that was a shade Gendry hadn't seen in nearly ten years, and had hoped to never seen again. It was partly the reason he was so nervous.

"READY...FIRE!"

An iron rain ascended to the sky. Even from a distance, Gendry could tell they'd landed true.

A closer scream had Gendry whipping his head around. Fuck. One archer had dropped his lit arrow, and the fire was spreading. Luckily, it was put out quickly. The men fired individually now, the _thwip_ of the bow was all Gendry could hear.

Glancing back toward the ironborn, Gendry could see they'd erected a shield wall around the oarsmen. For all the men killed, it made little difference.

He looked at the Trant lad, and sent a prayer to every god that he made it through this alive.

"BRACE!"

An unearthly crash knocked Gendry off his feet, and the ship rocked again as another ironborn vessel hit it head-on. Gendry clambered to his feet, and hefted his warhammer off the deck. With the battering rams nested so deeply within the hull, they wouldn't be able to shake the ironborn off.

Taking a breath, Gendry gave himself to the battle.

It was only moments of consciousness from that point. The taste as a hot spray of blood hit his mouth, the ringing in his ears after a shield hit him over the head, the vacant look on a man's face as Gendry smashed his skull in.

But one thing he realised, as his very bones and blood sung with the fight, was how much he'd missed this. Yet, so deeply was he in the battle fury that he almost took Ormund's head off.

"Gen-Gendry!" Ormund roared through the haze, "Look at me, we need to get off this ship! Another ironborn ship is about to board, and we don't have the men to repel them. Our fleet is almost gone, half the men dead!"

Gendry looked around, aghast. There were men still alive on their vessel, but on almost every Redwyne ship around them, the ironborn had outmanoeuvred and outnumbered them.

His men were tired and broken, many wounded. Gendry staggered when he met the unseeing eyes of Duncan Trant, his throat opened to the world and drowned in a river of his own blood.

Barely conscious, Gendry crouched down to the boy and closed his eyes with one hand. With the other, he rested his forehead in his palm and let out a loud sob. The boy should have lived.

"My lord, what do we do?!"

The panic in his steadfast knight's voice drew him back to the present, and he swallowed his grief. Not bothering to wipe his tears, Gendry turned to the men that remained.

He gathered them close, "We have no way off this ship without being captured, and the ironborn do not keep prisoners." He met each and every man's eye as equals, no matter what their house or birth, and said with a strength that belied his heartbreak and resignation, "I'm giving you an option to jump ship now, because I'm about to ask you all to give your lives to take these fuckers to the seven hell with us."

To their credit, not a single man moved.

Gendry nodded, jaw clenched, "In the captain's cabin, there are ten barrels of –

"The North!"

Gendry reeled. But the shout was echoed by both mainlanders and ironborn alike, all pausing in their desperate struggles.

For around the peninsula came at first one lone Stark warship, long and sleek as any of the Iron Fleet, and then two, then more. Gendry thought that perhaps the knock to the head was making him hallucinate, because coming their way was dozens, if not hundreds, of direwolf ships.

Ormund fell to his knees and openly wept, "Thank the Seven for the Starks."

Gendry felt like he had been reborn, vigour pulsing through him. The feeling was contagious. And so, when the third ironborn ship crashed into Gendry's ship, knocking them all to their arses once more, they arose angry and ready to throw themselves into the fray, wildfire forgotten.

Gendry led, his warhammer raised high and his voice eternal, "Kill the bastards!"

He sliced through the first ironborn's throat, so deep it was almost a beheading. The man's gristle lay bare to the world, the same as Duncan's had.

After that, he was pushed back slowly onto the deck. He used both sides of his warhammer, part axe and part true hammer, equally. Although, he thought as he crushed a man's kneecap and then his head, he did prefer the hammer side better.

His rage turned sour when he slipped in a pool of blood and his beloved hammer when sliding across the deck, under the dancing legs of men.

"Shit."

No other option, Gendry spotted a corpse with a fine-looking sword. He tried to rise, but slipped and fell again. An ironborn had finally noticed his struggle, and came with a bloody sword and a bloodier grin.

"_Shit._"

Gendry resorted to crawling, hoping the momentum of slippery decks made him faster than the other man. He was about to reach the sword when the ship lurched again, throwing the sword further away.

That's it. The gods obviously wanted him dead.

But instead of a descending sword, he instead heard a wet gurgle. Startled, he flipped over and was blinded, because it's only when he was in the midst of battle, slipping and sliding across the deck of a Redwyne ship, that he found out where his future was.

It was currently covered in blood, with a knife buried so deep in a man's ribs that her arm was practically in there as well.

"I thought you might need a hand," she grinned lazily, and he sighed for what he hoped was the final time.

Arya fucking Stark.

* * *

A/N: I've made a lot of assumptions with this story, e.g. the military strength of the Westerosi houses. I've assumed the population size has readjusted after all the shit going down in seasons 7 & 8 just so I can use similar military numbers from the books, but tbh it's unlikely.

Also just a note on the Mormonts: Dacey, Alysanne, Lyra, and Jorelle never existed in the show. To fit in with the show's canon, Maege and Dacey Mormont were killed at the Red Wedding, Alysanne was childless and was held under Riverrun with the other Northern lords, presumed dead and only returned once the Freys were ousted from Riverrun, while Lyra and Jorelle were younger than Lyanna at the time of the show. Alysanne is currently Lady of Bear Island, with two children.


	2. The Banefort

The aftermath of the North's arrival had been swift, and brutal. The surviving ironborn had been captured and rounded up, tied up underneath the decks of the ships. All the ships that couldn't be saved were burned, dead still onboard, minus their valuable steel.

While the Northern fleet was escorting – and in some cases pulling – all salvageable vessels back to Lannisport, a large contingent of Northern ships travelled to the Banefort with two hundred Baratheon soldiers.

There, the combined Westerosi armies had gathered to oust the ironborn from the castle. The grass outside the surrounding town had apparently run red with blood.

But Gendry tried not to focus on that, or the fact that the blood coating him had crusted and turned his shirts stiff as the deck beneath him. Gods what he wouldn't give for a hot bath right now.

He snorted. _What a good little highborn you've become._

The sky was once again faultless, and finally they were far enough north that Gendry couldn't smell the burning flesh of the dead. The waves were choppy with a light breeze, and Gendry heard gulls in the distance.

He leaned back against the starboard side of the Stark ship, exhausted. He hadn't been able to sleep in the day since the battle, body still screaming for a fight and mind churning. Out of the three-and-a-half thousand Baratheon and Reach men that had been on those sixty war galleys, less than fifteen hundred had survived.

And yet, he had survived where so many others had not. Not everyone had Gendry's luck. The cloaked body of young Duncan Trant hadn't done much to hide his fate, the grey wool dark with blood. Even in the chaos the battle had left behind, Gendry would make sure the boy was given proper funeral rites.

Arya hadn't talked to him since she had saved his life, but at the moment Gendry didn't have the energy to particularly care. He was bone-weary, and after being brought aboard Lord Brandon Flint's ship, Gendry had found a space for his men and Duncan's body on the upper deck, out of the way of the sailors.

The rugged outline of the coast gave him something to look at, and its monotonous shape finally sent him drifting into sleep.

He woke to one of his men shaking him. In the light of dusk, he startled when he realised Duncan's body was gone. Still half-asleep, he tried to rise, only to have his man inform him they had taken the body to be prepared.

With a jolt, he realised they were docked already.

Over a cliff, the foreboding castle of House Banefort rose. Its lands were used to being raided, with it being one of the closest mainland points to the Iron Islands. Yet even its defences weren't enough to stop an ironborn host of that size.

The black and grey banners of House Banefort's Hooded Man flew once again, and lower were the colours of other houses, the King's banner included.

Now awake and grinning, he saw Pod was waiting on the docks for him. They clasped each other in a firm hug, and Pod mumbled, "Good to see you're not dying on me yet."

Gendry let out a humourless laugh, but the emotion was genuine when he looked at his old friend, "I'm glad you're alive, too."

Pod pulled that half-smile of his, "I'm sorry about the lad, Gendry."

Softly, Gendry replied, "I am, too. Did we lose anyone here?"

Pod sighed and nodded, kneading the back of his neck, "Two thousand men, and Caswell got hit by half a dozen ironborn arrows in the siege when I had told him to stay back. He was a good brother, and I grieve for him, but he died an idiot. Brienne will be disappointed."

Gendry winced. He knew how much the lady knight's opinion matter to Pod. She was all he aspired to be, and Pod took it out on himself when he failed to meet those standards he set for himself.

Gendry clicked his tongue, and clapped Pod on the back, "Well then, now is as good a time as any to join the festivities and get well and truly drunk."

He was wobbling and giddy when he left the main hall to go to his chambers, heart lighter than it had been in weeks, when he saw a familiar face treading down the corridor.

Without the inhibition and fear of rejection that was usually there, Gendry called loudly, "Arya!"

"Arya!"

Exhaling his frustration at the stubborn wench, he ran down the hallway to catch up. He grabbed her by the shoulder to get her attention, only to find himself quickly upended and lying on the stone floor, arm held in a lock.

Dizziness flashed and blood rushed to his face, his body making an effort to keep up with his new situation. Looking up at the Stark princess, he grinned, "Was that really necessary?"

"No, but it was fun." She peered closer, "Are you drunk?"

"Certainly."

She laughed, and as much as Gendry wanted to watch that, his fingers were starting to prickle.

"Well, milady, how about letting go of my arm now?"

He must have said something wrong, because her face fell and she let go of his arm. With a sigh of relief, Gendry rolled his shoulder and climbed to his knees, still feeling the weight of those dark eyes on him. But just as he was about to get to his feet, she seized his chin and kissed him.

That one touch felt as though someone had stuck a hot poker to his lips, and he chased after the kiss as she pulled away.

"Arya?"

She looked at him with wide eyes, "I shouldn't have done that."

And then she was gone.

Gendry blinked once, twice, and then turned around to go back and get another drink.

He regretted that decision deeply the next day.

It was just the six of them in the room – Gendry, Arya, Genna Lannister, Pod, Bronn, and Asha Greyjoy, who had arrived from Pyke under threat of invasion. While they couldn't accuse her outright of sending the Iron Fleet, everybody knew the truth.

Gendry kept trying to catch Arya's eye, but she had steadfastly ignored his presence since the night of the feast.

As for the peace talks, it had been barely an hour into negotiations when things turned nasty.

Pod was in the middle of announcing the terms of peace, "You will give twenty ships, of good condition, to the Six Kingdoms and the North each. You will pay five thousand dragons in reparations to aid in restoring the holdings your people have destroyed. Finally, you will go to King's Landing and take an oath before your King to always be loyal. In return, we will give you the pirates back to do with as you will, we will not take preventative actions in the Iron Islands, and you will retain your rule over said islands." He looked up over the paper sternly, the very image of Lord Commander Brienne, "That will be our final offer, and you will sign it."

In that tense moment before Asha replied, Arya leant across the table, and said conversationally, "I said we shouldn't bother asking for your word, even a babe knows a Greyjoy's oath isn't worth shit."

Gendry felt like banging his head against the table.

Asha seethed, "You dare say that to me, after my brother _died _protecting yours?"

"Theon was more our brother than he _ever_ was yours. He grew up as a Stark, he died as a Stark, and we burnt his body as a Stark," Arya said, eyes alight with malice, "Truly is difficult, to be all alone in the world."

Gendry tensed as Asha stood, and readied himself to intervene, but someone was quicker.

Genna Lannister cleared her throat, gaining both women's startled attention. Smiling cheerfully, she said, "Now, now, let us have honesty and goodwill between friends."

That was rich. Judging from the faces around the room, everyone was of a similar opinion.

Asha Greyjoy had no visible reaction, but the stare between her and Arya was intense and unnerving.

Finally the Greyjoy leant back in her chair, breaking eye contact, "What do I care for pirates? They are certainly not worth forty ships and my men's trust. Put them in the seas for the Drowned God to have. I refuse to sign."

But Genna's smile dropped, and a sudden, sharp gaze was directed at Asha, "We all know you sent the fleet, you little kraken bitch, whether you own to it or not. Unless you submit and sign our generous terms, we'll invade properly within weeks, with the Starks from the north and the main Redwyne fleet from the south. You'll be defenceless, and we'll finally finish what we started two Greyjoy rebellions ago...I hear your son is nearing three years, and lives on Pyke with one of your saltwives, correct?"

There was a pause, and with a smile that reminded everyone that she was Tywin Lannister's sister, she finished, "Either way, we'll win this war, but one option is much less costly for you, and with fewer deaths."

Gendry grimaced. Trust a Lannister to kill a child for their parent's mistakes.

He tried to ignore the flash of Duncan's vacant face in his mind's eye.

But not one lord or lady contradicted Genna Lannister, even Gendry. They sat in silence as Asha's nostrils flared and she took a deep, steadying breath. Closing her eyes, she grunted, "Fine. I accept your terms, and I wish you good travels to your seven hells."

No sooner than she had signed the document, she rose and strode from the room, shoving past the guard at the doors.

Pod sighed, face shuttered, "Well, that went well."

"That was unhelpful, Arya."

She ignored Gendry, and still she refused to meet his eyes. Gendry's jaw ticked. Running an idle hand through his hair, he motioned to the soldiers at the door, "Call for the other lords and ladies to come through."

Arya rose, and said to the table, "I'll go find my people."

Gendry watched her as she went, and only just caught the end of Pod's mumbling.

"What?"

"I said, you should tell them to wait at least another hour," Pod muttered irritably, "I need to get drunk to deal with this mess."

Gendry pursed his lips, not knowing if he was joking or not, "We need to get you away from Bronn."

None the less, he brought the soldiers back to let the highborns know the meeting would be postponed an hour. He needed fresh air.

He had been walking outside the keep, chatting to Stormlands and Crownlands men about their days, when he heard loud jeering and cheering from the Stark camp. Men were running towards the sound, some drunk, others curious, and all seemingly eager.

"What's going on there?" Gendry asked the man he had been talking to, a Swann man-at-arms from the Dornish marches named Tovall.

"I don't know, milord. Up to no good, by the looks of 'em."

Gendry agreed, and followed the stream of men pulled toward the Stark camp, as if by a lodestone. As he drew closer, he saw the men were crowded around the encampment where the ironborn captives were being held before being shipped back to Pyke. The air had an earthy tang to it, from being rustled by so many boots. If Gendry was being fanciful, he would say the air smelt of violence as well.

For at the centre was Lord Brandon Flint raging across the space, eyes feverish as the crowd hung on every word that spilled from his mouth.

"Sending them back was a price for peace. But where is the justice? Where is the justice when we send them back, only for them to raid our homes and enslave our families when our backs are turned?" Brandon Flint roared, and the crowd roared with him.

He made it a spectacle, and his utter conviction was quickly turning the crowd into a mob. There were shouts of agreement and support from all there, whether it be from the North or the South, red and gold or white and grey.

It was a dangerous energy, one which Gendry would rather not involve himself in if he didn't have a reason. The dozens of ironborn men tied to posts in the centre of the clearing withered in on themselves, many with fear evident on their faces. Some starting struggling, desperate to get out of their ropes, but to no avail.

"However!" Brandon declared, his face setting to stone and his voice lowering, men crowding forward to hear more, "Our princess is a Stark, and Starks see justice _done_."

He turned to a figure standing by the side, and with a jolt he realised it was Arya, surrounded by other Northern highborns. When Arya nodded to Lord Flint, Stark soldiers advanced on the ironborn.

With the soldiers now out of the way, Gendry could see what he thought to originally be plain campfires were in fact purposed with heating up pokers.

His dread grew.

A savage grin, Brandon concluded, "Aye, we must send them back, but no-where in that agreement said we had to send them back with their hands. Let us see them raid and reave when they cannot raise so much as a piece of bread!"

Helpless and unable to intervene, Gendry watched on. Scraping sounds echoes the clearing as iron swords were drawn. He left when the screams started, unable to stomach more.

He left to the sound of cheering.

Things only got worse from there.

The reconvened war council, now including the others that were left out previously, needed to discuss the dismantling of the armies. The highborns eventually arrived, with the seats allocated to the North noticeably absent.

"Where is the North?" Aemon Estermont demanded, "Do they not follow the same time as the rest of Westeros, now?"

"I heard they were busy-like with removing the ironborn from their hands," Bronn said smugly, apparently amused by the violence.

Baelor Hightower grunted, "A gristly thing, that, but one that will save us from those soldiers raiding again. The Greyjoy woman won't be happy, though."

"Frankly, I couldn't care less if they came or not," Lyonel Frey spat, as Addam Marbrand grimaced at the man.

"Well we best boot the North out then, if the mighty Lord Frey and his three hundred men could care less."

Willem Frey glared at Olyvar, "You were a Frey once, too."

Olyvar bowed his head playfully, "And every day I thank the Seven for my mother's name."

Then, one of the foulest odours Gendry had ever smelt permeated the room, and everyone went silent. Arstan Selmy could always be counted upon, and in that moment Gendry almost admired the man's arse for silencing the pettiness of lords. Gendry pinched his brow, trying to massage the coming headache away. In hindsight, he wished he would have followed Pod and Bronn's advice and found himself a good wine.

The doors swung open, and the Banefort's castellan announced, "Princess Arya of House Stark, Commander of the Northern Fleets, and Shield of –

"Gods, stop."

The man was put off by the interruption as Arya brushed past him, and he struggled to announce the rest quickly enough, blurring the names together, "Lord Brandon Flint of Flint's Finger, Lady Meera Reed of Greywater Watch, Lady Alysane Mormont of Bear Island, Lyra Mormont of Bear Island, and Patrek Mallister, Heir to Seaguard."

The poor man looked exhausted.

"By the Seven," Gendry heard Martyn Lannister whisper to his cousin, "They're all women. No wonder the North is so bloody mad!"

Gendry sighed. Gods he hated Lannisters.

The Northerners, and Patrek Mallister, moved as a block. Dour faces, lean bodies, and foreboding eyes seemed to be their common feature. The heavy wood of the chairs squealed as they were pulled back. Gendry winced.

He was sure the Mormont chit was drawing out the sound on purpose.

Pod stood, the good man he was, and made introductions for the rest of the table. Highborns were so finicky when not introduced to each other properly.

Alysane Mormont, a brawny woman with a strong nose, snarled, "Oh look, friends, more Freys. Lannisters, too. How _delightful_. Perhaps we should look for hidden crossbows. "

Genna Lannister's hand was the only thing that stopped Martyn Lannister from rising with outrage, and there was silence. Gendry looked at the closed door wistfully. Give him a good axe and a boatload of ironborn any day over politics and grudges.

"So how is it that the Mallisters of Seaguard came to be with the Northern Fleet," Arstan Selmy asked with genuine curiosity.

Patrek Mallister raised his chin, "The ironborn came for Seaguard, and even a fortress such as ours couldn't hold them forever. They were in the process of sacking Seaguard town when crannogmen ambushed the reavers still on land, at which point the Starks arrived to capture the ships and rescue our people taken as slaves."

He nodded to Arya and Meera Reed, and said with a low voice, "The Starks and the North have always been friends to Seaguard, even when our own kin in the Riverlands have abandoned us for their own greed."

At the last sentence, various lords and ladies around the room stiffened. Gendry couldn't blame them. Patrek had made the sentiments of Seaguard very clear. With Mallister lands so close to the Northern border, it gave an opening for the North to potentially further influence the Riverlands, as if the ties of kinship weren't enough already.

As if they needed any other problems today.

Swallowing his nerves, Gendry cleared his throat. "Back to the matter at hand, then. How many men and ships should we be retaining at Banefort, and for how long, to ensure Pyke's compliance to this renewed peace?"

It was going reasonably well, and they were making good progress. Fifteen Northern ships, and ten thousand men from the Westerlands and the Crownlands would remain at the Banefort for two months, and the Redwyne ships on their way from the Arbour would leave twenty war galleys at Lannisport until the Westerlands could rebuild their defences.

It was all going reasonably well, until the door opened to one of the Frey men-at-arms. Eyes searching, he quickly found Lyonel Frey. Rushing over, he whispered something in Lyonel's ear.

Gendry watched as the man's face went from pink to pale, then to red.

"My cousin, Steffon Frey," he announced, "Has been poisoned within his camp. He died ten minutes ago, choking on his own spittle."

Gendry resisted the urge to massage his brow once more. There was a general outcry, more because it was a highborn that had been poisoned rather than affection for the late Frey. Willem Frey looked more upset than his uncle, and both glowered at Arya.

Too late, Gendry saw where this was going. For who else was there to blame than the woman infamous for wiping out the Twins?

She caught their look and sighed, waving a hand with irritation, "Look, I'm not going to say I'm sorry that your poor Frey is dead, because I'm not. But I didn't kill him."

"Why would we believe you?" Willem Frey, a boy barely over fourteen years, hissed, "Maybe you want to finish the job you started."

"Tempting," Arya spat.

"I think we may need to calm down a bit, lad." Bronn said in what Gendry was sure was the most diplomatic tone Bronn could manage.

The boy turned on Bronn, "Calm? She slaughtered my whole entire family! My grandfathers, brothers, cousins, uncles... All that remains are ten members of House Frey, destitute and without our ancestral seat."

"More members than you left my family after the Red Wedding."

"Aye, ours too." Spoke Lyra Mormont, echoed by Brandon Flint.

Willem, suddenly meek, answered, "I wasn't at the Red Wedding." Gendry edged his hand toward his sword as he felt tension rise.

Arya shrugged, "And now your family are mighty lords of the Mountain's hovel, which your Lannister relatives so generously gave you, and I have avenged my family. Why would I need to kill more when only the dregs remain?" She then propped her muddy boots up on the table, "Can we get a move on with this nonsense? I'm bored already."

But Lyonel Frey, interrupted, now a dazzling shade of ruby, "If it wasn't her, then she would just have her treacherous pet frogeater do it!" he snarled, pointing at Meera Reed. To Meera's credit, she merely looked bewildered.

But it wasn't the North that was first in defending Lady Reed. Balon Swann spoke with great distain, "I would be very careful, my lord, who you accuse of what. There is absolutely no evidence, and King Bran might take great offence that you would insult his royal sister as well as his beloved childhood friend so."

"Yes, Frey," Gendry agreed coldly, at the same time that Genna Lannister hissed at her son, "That's _enough_."

"Really," Paxter Redwyne said generously, "It could be anyone, soldier or otherwise. Your family hasn't garnered much goodwill over the years."

Lyonel Frey's eyes widened, strangled by his own rage. Gendry saw the precise moment where he lost all sense, and the man slammed his fist down on the table, face red as he screamed, "I want that murderous bitch gone!"

The room went deathly silent, each face watching the North to see what they would do, as the North watched Arya Stark.

Arya looked at him mildly, considering the sweating man in front of her as a hawk might a particularly feeble rabbit. Finally, she leant forward and rested her arms on the table, and said with a calm voice, "Frey, I'll say this a last time. If I wanted to kill any other members of your family, they would have been dead years ago, and you would have known it was me.

She leant back in her chair, and a sharp smile curved around dead eyes, "As it happens, I already had my fill of revenge. It was one of the greatest pleasures I have ever known, watching your grandfather enjoy two slices of pie made with the flesh of his own sons, just before I slit his throat from ear to ear, then to wear his face while I poisoned your brothers, your cousins, and yours uncles. They must have died believing him a kinslayer."

The room was filled with a horrified silence, Lyonel's anger quickly deflated. Into the quiet, he whispered, "You're mad."

"No, just a servant of the Many-Faced God."

Gendry fought a shiver, and did the only thing he knew how, "This council is dismissed for the day. We'll finalise this on the morrow."

He rose from his chair and practically threw himself from the room.

In the days after the battle, the bodies were gathered and burned in immense bonfires far from the camps. Gendry didn't know that the practice had reached so far south, but none the less was glad for it. It made him feel more secure.

So the bodies were ash, but the smell of violence remained. The blood spilled on the battlefield had turned the earth a rusty hue, and from the vantage point of the battlements, Gendry saw a sizable group of soldiers converge around a particularly bloody part.

He rolled his eyes at the sight and turned away.

"What are they doing, my lord?" Ormund asked from beside him.

"They," Gendry snorted, "Are planting a weirwood tree, from a seed taken from the branches of the heart tree at Winterfell itself. Or so I'm told. The blood serves as their sacrifice to the Old Gods, and they will leave men behind to protect the sapling. When the tree is old enough, they'll ask a green man to depart the Isle of Faces and carve the sapling into a heart tree, so it may be at the centre of a new godswood."

Ormund frowned, "Some of those soldiers are House Costayne men. I fear for our place in the heavens if this blasphemy has truly reached so far south."

Gendry stared at him. He didn't realise Ormund was so devout. Cautiously, Gendry replied, "Many follow the Old Religion these days, after King Bran was crowned, or if their kin returned from the North. I don't blame them, neither. If you had seen the things we have seen, those of us who fought at Winterfell, you would follow the Old Gods as well."

"Ah, yes. Grumpkins and snarks. A fine replacement for the Light of the Seven..."

Gendry held back against the flash of rage, but failed. He gazed down at his knight.

"Ser Ormund," he said with a mild voice, "I like you, and I respect your devotion. It's because of this that I'll tell you, here and now, if you ever mock those that fought in the War for the Dawn again, soon afterwards you won't have a tongue with which to mock _anyone_."

But for a moment, Ormund's brows reached almost to his hairline, and then quickly he bent his head low, "I apologise, my lord, for any offence given. I will endeavour to not dismiss these stories or the Old Religion in future."

Pretty words for a pretty lie. Nevertheless he replied with a brief, "Good."

Ormund lifted his head, and a somewhat sheepish smile crept onto his face, "If I may say, though, my lord...never have I thought you resembled your late uncle, the Lord Stannis, until this day."

The smile was contagious, and despite remaining ill-humoured Gendry gave a half-hearted grin, "You may not."

Turning his attention toward the harbour, Gendry rested his eyes on the direwolf flag. Long moments passed.

Arya was likely onboard at this very moment, doing gods knew what. Seven hells, it would be good to have a proper conversation with her. His stomach clenched at the thought, and his traitorous mind slipped into another direction. Had she taken another lover since him? Perhaps Lord Brandon, or one of her cr—

"Don't do it. She'll tear your heart out and eat it for breakfast."

Gendry scowled, "Shut up, Pod. When did your mangy arse get up here anyway?"

Pod's self-satisfied smirk lit up his face, "I had reports that the mighty Lord Baratheon was brooding on the battlements. I placed a bet with Bronn, and as it turns out, that fucker owes me a lot of money."

"Are you talking about the Princess Arya?" Came Ormund's curious voice from his other side.

"Aye, the fool mopes over her ever since she stole his balls to decorate her purse."

Gendry set his shoulders and stared resolutely ahead to the horizon, determined to ignore them.

"Yes, I had gathered. I almost sent out a search party for them. Every time he takes too much Dornish wine at supper, there's always a story about the time Arry did this, or milady did that. I feel like I know the chit."

Gendry narrowed his eyes, patience worn to its quick demise. "I'm going to visit the Stark soldiers," he informed them, and set off down the stairs to the sound of pitying groans behind him.

"We bet on that, too," Pod mentioned casually to Ormund.

The two guards to see him approach were ones he recognised from Winterfell.

It really didn't feel like almost a decade since the Long Night. Gendry could recall every horrifying detail as if it were yesterday. Often he woke at night sweating after dreams that he were still on that fucking battlefront, watching the flaming Dothraki swords smothered by the darkness. Sometimes he is still in disbelief that he managed to survive it.

Apparently the soldiers recognised him too, as both performed a quick nod, and one man grinned, "Commander Stark is in her chambers, my lord. I'll show you to the ship."

Gendry thanked the man, but thinned his lips as he followed. He was beginning to regret following through with this idiotic impulse.

But before he could turn around, he was already at her door, knocking. The grinning guard from before loitered on the stairwell, and Gendry gave him the best glare he could muster to send the nosy bastard on his way.

The door opened to a set of stormy eyes, "You're stomping loud enough to wake the fucking dead all over again."

"Let me in, and we can let the Night King go back to sleep."

_Subtle._

Arya rolled her eyes, but left the door open for him to enter. He closed it slowly as he looked at her cabin. The slightly pungent smell was from the tallow candles lighting the room with a soft glow, and bedding lay on the floor instead of swinging from the roof. Aside from a chair stamped with the direwolf sigil, a map pinned to the wall, and a small desk, that was all that the room contained.

"If you've come here to lecture me about today, don't."

"I wasn't going to, Arya."

She narrowed her eyes in suspicion, "Not even for ignoring you?"

"No." He _knew _she had been doing that on purpose.

"Not for the hands?"

"That was your prerogative, lovely though it was."

"Not even for the things I said at the council?"

Gendry pursed his lips, "No?" The word swerved up at the end.

She knew he was lying, he could see it, but she said nothing.

There was a pause, "Why not?"

Gendry thought for a moment, and answered honestly, "You told me you were eleven the first time you killed, and later, at Winterfell, I had heard other things. Violence has always been a part of your story, and I've always accepted that."

Accepted, perhaps, but forgotten often. The need to protect and shelter her was there as strong as ever. Gendry tried to smother it.

"You've changed." She said, a curious glint in her eye, "You speak and act like a lord now."

He shifted from one foot to the other, "Maybe. Not in the way it matters, though." He frowned, "You have, too."

And it was true. She wielded power more comfortably these days, seemed more at ease with herself.

She tilted her head to the side, "Maybe. Sansa tricked me into building and leading this fleet, and with the rebuilding of Deepwood Motte. It isn't nearly as annoying as I thought it would be when I was younger."

So a lady in all but name, then, Gendry thought bitterly.

"I heard your sister had a son?"

Arya's entire disposition changed in that moment, a flash of that stubborn girl whose greatest wish was to be with her family again.

"Rickard," she said with a small smile, "He is nearing three years, now. He has the Stark look, all dark curls and grey eyes. The Northerners were overjoyed, they wanted to call him Eddard, but Sansa said it was too soon for her to start naming children after our dead. She is with child again, maybe this one we will name after Mother or Father."

He tried the next question carefully, "And Sansa isn't married?"

Her scowl told him his question hadn't been received well, "Who Sansa lets into her bed is nobody's business but her own. She should be able to choose who she fucks, for once in her life."

Gendry held up his hands, "I didn't mean any offence, it's just curious is all."

Arya shrugged, "It's hardly uncommon now to have heirs that were legitimised. There were barely any members of any houses left after the War of the Five Kings, the Great War, and the Dragon Queen. Women and legitimised bastards are heads of many houses now, and women fight in our armies and navy."

Yes, he had noticed women in soldier's garb. Several of his men had complained, to which Gendry had replied scathingly. Not that there weren't any in the Six Kingdoms, some girls from minor houses had taken after Brienne's path, but clearly not as many as in the North.

Arya continued, "She gets some stuffy old lords who make a fuss, but commoners and most highborns alike love her too much for any of them to kick up a real stink, and the rest fear her."

He remembered the elder Stark sister's imperious blue eyes. He would fear her, too. Yet the idea of such a proper lady being remorseless about birthing bastards raised an interesting question. How different would it be, to grow up and live as a bastard of the north now, he wondered.

"And your sister?" She asked hesitantly. He had a feeling she only asked because it was expected. Small talk was, for both of them, painful.

Yet, Gendry beamed, "Finding out about Mya was a surprise, and one of the best days of my life. She rules the Stormlands while I'm in King's Landing better than I ever could."

"I'm surprised you haven't found a lady and married yet," she said with a forced smile, obviously trying to make a joke and failing miserably. Awkwardness descended between them.

Gendry bit his lip and said with false bravado, "Not for the lack of my bannermen's efforts, I can tell you. The stormlords are the worst, but lately there's been a bigger effort from the other lords from the Reach or further north."

"Why haven't you accepted, surely you need an heir?"

Gendry looked at her, and said dishonestly, "I don't know."

Awkwardness descended again, and without thinking, Gendry said the first thing that came to mind.

"Have you had lovers since then?"

He cringed. The question was beneath both of them, but the it burned. The tension between them turned from awkward to something heavier.

He was thankful that she didn't avoid his gaze, "A few. Long past, though."

Gendry nodded, and accepted it for what it was. He had certainly taken no oath of celibacy either. He looked to his clenched hands.

She continued, though, to Gendry's surprise. With an odd hitch, she said, "They all tried to make me into something I'm not."

"Like I did?"

"Yes."

Emotion settling into his throat, Gendry asked, "What if I didn't, Arya? What if I didn't try to change you at all? Would it be different then?"

He looked up at her, and saw her face frozen. The image of an animal cornered in a trap came to his mind's eye. With a sigh, he looked away, not wanting to see the rejection as it came. _Stupid bastard._

"I should go, Arya." He stood to leave, and made it within a length to the door before a hand grabbed his.

Letting himself face her, he watched her warily. Her face was wide open, expressive like it had been when they were children.

"Stay," she said in a soft tone that was the closest thing to begging he had ever heard from Arya Stark. "I can't promise anything, but please...Stay."

Any resistance he had within himself crumbled.

Gently at first, he pressed his mouth to hers, and caressed his fingers gently down to cup her cheek, desperate not to scare her. But then a small sound came from her mouth in protest, and she deepened the kiss, gripping harder onto his arm.

That was all it took. Within moments, they were up against the wall, fingers working against ties, breaths heavy as they tried to make their way over to the bedding, and rough, desperate kisses as they could do neither fast enough.

All he could think was, this was his future, and his blood sung with the feeling of coming home.


	3. A Stag Bucks his Chains

Gendry woke to the gentle rocking of the ship, and the yelling of Stark soldiers as they went about their morning duties at the docks. With an arm, he stretched out to the bedding beside him, and sighed. She was gone.

He wasn't disappointed. If anything he expected it.

Which was why he nearly jumped out of his skin when he opened his eyes to see her standing in the corner of the room, watching him.

"Seven hells, Arya! Give a man some warning!"

She scoffed, and stalked over and perched on the edge of the bed, "You're not much of a great and mighty warrior, Lord Baratheon, if you can't notice when an assassin is in your rooms."

He cast an evil eye in her direction, before a sly thought took his mind. With a grin, lunged toward Arya. Alarmed and skittish, she tried to leap out of the way.

_Too late_. He pounced, gleefully holding her tight against his body while she wriggled.

"I let you do that, brute," came a muffled grunt from under his shoulder.

If anything, Gendry grinned wider, "In fact, I'm sure of it."

* * *

That grin stayed with Gendry for the next few days, much to the amusement of everyone around him. He rarely slept in his own chambers, and it showed.

Despite their proximity to one another, talk remained light-hearted and shallow. Gendry tiptoed around what he had said in that first, rushed night, and instead focused all his attention on learning her body once again.

"And where did you get this one?" He asked one night, tracing light fingers over the deep scar that started at her collarbone and went upwards.

Arya had currently draped herself across his torso, as if he were a particularly muscular pillow. Gendry didn't mind in the slightest, as evidenced by his teasing fingers.

"First night we arrived on Northoss, the local people had thought us evil spirits come to steal them or some such superstition. One of them threw a spear at me, and it would have hit my heart if I hadn't ducked at the last second. As it were, the spear still did quite a lot of damage."

She turned over, now face-to-face with him, and brushed her fingers against his thigh, "And you? How did you get this scar?"

Gendry groaned, both with the fact that his body was inevitably reacting to her and the fact that she had chosen _that _scar.

He reluctantly grumbled out a reply, "I was just learning to use my warhammer, rather than a battle hammer. I forgot but for a moment that there is a blade on one end, and nearly took my own leg off."

Arya was silent. At first, Gendry thought it might have been with concern, but one look at her face told him she was barely restraining laughter.

"It's not funny, Arry." He said crossly.

The dam burst. Her laughter pealed across the room, whole-hearted and pure. Gendry scowled at his lover. On a whim, he rolled to one side, dumping Arya next to him, despite to her loud complaints.

"If you're going to laugh at me, find a proper pillow."

"Oh, don't be such a sook." She said, eyes still shining with mirth.

"I'm not being a sook."

"Yes, you are."

Gendry turned his back to her, now determined to not speak.

Instead of the cold-shoulder it was, Arya took it as a chance to cuddle up behind him, breathing deeply into his hair.

"My pillows aren't as warm as you." she murmured, hands reaching.

Gendry smirked. He never could stay cross for very long.

* * *

His grin lasted until the day that the _Nymeria_ and rest of the Stark fleet set sail for Deepwood Motte.

It had been dawn, a brilliant orange mottled with pink and brushed with wisps of clouds. It had cast the place a soft, romantic light on everything it touched, even the Banefort. Gendry was sure then that the gods were mocking them, because it was in that romantic light that he had stood on the bustling decks of Arya's ship, facing her, and failing to find the words to say goodbye.

"Arya –"

"Gendry –"

They both gave a brief laugh. "You first." he said thickly.

Arya's brows knitted together, and Gendry thought she would remain silent until she whispered, "What if I don't want violence to be the only part to my story?"

Gendry's eyes widened, and restraining himself only barely, he leaned down to cradle her face, touching their brows together, "So don't let it be."

He kissed her then, and tried to pour everything he couldn't say into that moment. He broke the kiss when he heard wolf whistles from Arya's crew.

She scowled at them all, "Don't you have work to be doing?" Quickly they all found other places to be.

Gendry smirked, and placing a last kiss on her cheek, he left. He hadn't said goodbye, it hadn't felt right, and Gendry had long since learned to trust his gut.

And yet, since then sobriety and a deep, dull ache became his closest companions.

The armies left the Banefort without much fanfare, travelling south until they hit the gold road. From there, both themselves and the supply wagons travelled easier. The sun was overly bright this side of the journey, and its touch was burning. His leathers now reeked of sweat and unwashed bodies. Gendry was beginning to think he just hated travelling by horse in general.

The second week into their journey east to King's Landing, something snapped, and Gendry turned to his friend, "I cannot wait another ten years before I see her again, Pod."

There was a pause, and he startled when suddenly Pod threw his hands up to the skies, "Seven, thank you for hearing my prayers!"

Gendry blinked.

"I mean," said Pod, turning back to him, "That I'm glad the mute has finally broken his vow of silence. I thought for a good while that this time she had stolen your tongue."

"I'm serious, Pod."

Pod exhaled, his dark eyes sombre, "I know, my friend. My thoughts are this – after all the horror we have seen, we deserve to be happy in whatever way we can be. Arya included."

Gendry frowned, leaning backward in his saddle, "So you think I should leave her be?"

"What? No, you idiot," Pod retorted, shaking his head. "I haven't seen you this full of life in a long time, my friend. Beside, King Bran told me once on a whim that his sister had only ever loved one man. I hazard you to take a guess as to who that is. "

Gendry was silent for many long moments. Finally he said, "I need to go to Storm's End to get my sister."

"You need to get your sister," Pod agreed.

* * *

Once upon a time, Gendry had thought that convincing his sister to take up rule of Storm's End would be the easiest part of his plan.

Since then, Gendry learnt that he was – unequivocally – a moron.

"And so, you would throw me to the vultures in King's Landing just so you can gallivant north to profess you undying love to Westeros' most infamous killer? Not _fucking_ likely!"

Gendry sighed, in what was possibly the tenth argument they've had of this kind. He's not really sure, though, he stopped counting after the fifth.

"You already run Storm's End anyway, Mya. And you won't be Master of War, so you wouldn't have to be in Kings—"

"I'm going for a ride. I'll see you at supper."

She whipped around and strode out, leaving Gendry in her wake. With the woods surrounding Storm's End and it's small town stretching an eternity, there was no telling how long she would actually be gone. Not that he was concerned; Mya outstripped everyone when it came to riding and hunting. It was actually something of a novelty amongst the bannermen.

Gendry looked at Ormund with deep desperation, "You understand why I have to do this, right? I'll regret it for the rest of my life if I don't."

The slight whine in his own voice annoyed him, and it seemed Ormund was similarly unimpressed, "I can't claim to understand, my lord. If I was one of the most powerful men in the realm, I certainly wouldn't be giving it up for anyone. And certainly not for someone who's as likely to kill me in my sleep as to fuck me, pardon the language."

Gendry looked at him through beady eyes, "I've decided I don't like you very much."

"Only took you nine-and-a-half years."

* * *

Storm's End lived up to its namesake. It was one of Gendry's favourite things about the place, watching the storms as they rolled in from the horizon, rumbling their warnings to find shelter quickly.

So now, Gendry sat on the wall closest to the sea, and watched as the waves boomed against the cliff-face, white-wash coiling around the rocks. The rain pissed across his face, stinging as the wind raced behind it. Lighting lit blackened clouds, and the smell of wet earth filled his mouth.

He was thoroughly soaked to the bone and freezing his balls off, but by the Seven he loved it. It would be one of the things he missed the most.

A voice called out from under the shelter of a turret, "If you don't get warm soon, you might not even make it to the bloody North in the first place, you godscurst idiot. Honestly, what kind of fool sits in the fucking rain?"

"Aren't ladies not meant to swear? And be generally kind and sweet-tempered?"

"I reserve this language for private company. And we haven't finished our _discussion_. Come back inside."

Gendry took one last longing look at the storm, and then went to face the one inside.

"Can you hear yourself? You're willingly to give up everything you ever dreamed, just to follow after a girl that rejected you, who didn't want to marry you or even write to you for almost _ten years_! Then she beds you for a few nights and all is forgiven? You're mad!"

"I tried to change her the first time, to make her a lady when she wasn't. I won't make that mistake again."

"Aye, and now she's a princess. I've heard what some of the lords say – she rules Deepwood Motte and the Northern Fleets, and her people would follow her over the edge of the world. How is that any different to what you once offered her? Has she even said that she will have you, once you abandon your birthright, your family, and your people for her?"

She sounded so convincing that doubt began to creep into Gendry's thoughts. She was right in many things – Arya had never given any promises, and in the North, Gendry would be practically lowborn once again. What right did a lowborn have to be in love with a princess?

He had to search deep, but buried there was an undeniable truth. "They say Robert pined for Lyanna Stark all his life. He was a terrible king that left such instability in his wake that we almost didn't survive. Do you understand? If I don't find out for myself, make this mistake for myself, I'll spend the rest of my life wondering what could have been. I am not our father, Mya, but I well could be."

Mya closed her eyes and grunted, "You _have_ gotten fatter, now I think of it."

"That's not what I meant. And its muscle." Gendry snapped.

"I'm only telling the gods' truth."

But then he felt something in the air give way. She sighed, and muttered, "If you would have me be resigned to this fate, brother, at least understand the consequences of your actions. We are both legitimised bastards, a stain on the Seven's honour. But you are a war hero, a great warrior, and a likeable man. You claim to be bad at ruling, Gendry, but you have never seen yourself clearly. Your people are happy, and they love you and respect you."

She snorted self-deprecatingly, and continued, "I, on the other hand, have fought in no wars, I have no songs sung of me. Most importantly, I am a woman. They will not follow me, for I will never be you. "

Gendry took his sister's had beseechingly, "They _will _follow you. They will have to, because do you honestly believe that any on the Small Council would abandon you? King's Landing might be a cesspit, but our strongest allies are there. Or what of Storm's End? You are one of the most competent rulers I have seen, man or woman, and none here would betray you. The bannermen? Most will be sending their second sons to secure a match; the temptation of Storm's End is too much for them."

The words kept pouring from his mouth, and Gendry was unable to stem four-and-thirty years of insecurity, "Mya, I'm tired of pretending to be a lord. I'm tired of being afraid that what I say will be thought of as common, thought of as unworthy, and I'm tired of being a mediocre ruler – and I am, don't lie to me. You and my advisors do most of my work, and the only time I rule well is in war. We may come from the same background, sister, but you excel in their games in a way I will never be able."

"Beside," he asked with a jovial lilt, "What other Baratheon heir do you know of to take your place?"

She looked up from her lowered face, and Gendry realised for the first time that his sister's insecurities ran as deep as his.

Finally a small smile was coaxed from her, and she conceded, "If Arya is as half as beautiful as her sister, then I understand. Half the fool boys in the Vale were madly in love with Alayne Stone, as I recall."

Gendry always forgot that Mya had been exposed to royalty long before Bran had called her down to King's Landing. He sometimes wondered what it would have been like to have grown up openly known as the King's bastard.

Maybe he too would have been granted a position in a keep, sheltered by highborns seeking the good grace of a king, rather than slurping bowls o' brown in the Flea Bottom gutters or avoiding Tobho Mott's backhand.

He put aside the stray thoughts, and answered earnestly, "Arya isn't beautiful, at least not to most people. But she has such a fire inside her that you cannot help but be drawn to it. It's a fire that allowed her to kill the Night King, a fire that led her across the Sunset Seas to a New World and back again. I cannot – I will not – let a life with her pass by again. Not for all the titles in the world."

Mya squinted at him, "Arya Stark is a Faceless-trained assassin that has murdered more people than either of us could possibly count, and yet by that description I fear you may have just inspired all the minstrels' songs for the next century."

After a moment, Mya sighed, "Fine then. Let it be done. But first you have to receive approval from the King himself, so maybe he will see reason where you evidently have none."

Gendry grinned.

* * *

They entered the city through the Mud Gate.

King's Landing had changed in many ways over the past years, and in many ways it had not. The streets still bore scars of Cersei and Daenerys. The people, too. Deep gouges in the corner of a building here, shiny red scar tissue over a grown woman's face there.

But the people here seemed good at forgetting the horrors that had rained down upon them not so long ago. The city streets – the smells, sounds, and sights – were now as colourful and as overbearing as they had been in his youth.

Although maybe not the smell. That had definitely improved. With the reconstruction of the city, Tyrion had leapt at the chance to install as many sewerage systems as his heart desired. Gendry certainly thought the stink of shit and offal wasn't nearly as strong any more.

On horseback, the bustling city streets parted for him. The sight still unnerved him every time, it felt wrong.

He might have felt at home, had he been in the Bottom and on foot, but this part of the city was for rich merchants and lesser noble houses. Folk in these parts knew what that black and yellow stag meant, knew that a retinue this large must only be for the returning Baratheon lord and his heir, the Lady Mya Baratheon.

Gendry looked back at the gilded carriage behind him. Ormund had already sworn to him, much like other Stormlands knights, that he would advise and serve her faithfully. She would make a good leader.

Turning his attention to the present, he found the retinue slowing to a halt in the courtyard of the Red Keep. Dismounting, Gendry set his jaw and prepared himself for what he had to do.

The Small Council meeting was short, and to the point. Gendry gave his own report of the fight against the ironborn, although he was sure Pod had already given something more succinct to the Council many weeks ago.

Bronn was still in Highgarden, no doubt making his good-father's life hell, and Davos had returned to his lands in Cape Wrath, reuniting with his wife and his surviving sons. Other than them, all of the Small Council was present. The Prince of Dorne's brother, Prince Olyvar, had accepted the position as Master of Laws, and the title of Master of Whispers bizarrely had gone to William Mooton, Lord of Maidenpool.

Gendry was no mastermind, but he rather thought the latter position defunct. King Bran and his thousand eyes knew of matters before they even reached the ears of spies, and Gendry sometimes wondered what had made Bran pluck the Maidenpool lord from obscurity.

He supposed he was rather biased, too. Mooton was a slimy bastard, currently locked in a battle for the title of Regent of Horn Hill against Lady Melessa Florent, in the name of its young lord and their mutual grandson, Lord Alan Tarly.

The youth was only an infant when his father had been burnt by Daenerys. His mother, Lady Eleanor Mooton, had died three years later from fever. The boy and his orphaned siblings had been raised by their grandmother, and their aunt, Talla Tarly, but apparently the temptation of the Reach castle had been too much for Lord Mooton.

It made things awkward occasionally during Small Council meetings, as Samwell could never resist sending insults veiled as cheerful reflections and musings toward the man, and whether they were received or not made no matter to Sam at all.

Today was no different.

"I'm glad they have the good stuff today, rather than that Dornish swill they usually serve us," Lord Mooton grumbled.

"Oh dear, I hope that isn't the Arbour you're drinking. I heard the cook found rats floating in the barrel this morning."

Lord Mooton spat out his mouthful onto the table. Lord Commander Brienne, as always, managed to look both imposing and disapproving.

A thoughtful look crossed Sam's face, "I thought as Master of Whispers, you might have known..."

Prince Olyvar, young as he was, didn't even attempt to cover his smirk. Gendry managed to muffle his laugh under a cough, and at the head of the table, Tyrion was likewise looking red-faced.

Clearing his throat, Tyrion begun, "Yes, well, aside from the tragedy in the Keep's kitchens, I think that concludes our session for today, if it pleases our King. Was there anything else?"

Gendry stiffened as Bran, sitting at the head of the table, looked toward Gendry with those strange eyes, "Lord Baratheon wishes to say something."

Gendry swallowed. He hated when the King did that, it made his skin crawl. Clicking his tongue once in thought, Gendry roughly stood. The chair squealed against the stone of the floor, but he succeeded in gaining the attention of the room.

"I came here today to formally request abdication of my titles, and all the rights entailed. Instead I ask that they be passed to my sister and heir, the Lady Mya of House Baratheon."

They all did a wonderful job of appearing shocked.

Taken aback at the lack of protest, Gendry asked Pod, who was standing behind the King, "Did you already tell them?"

Pulling a face, Pod shook his head.

"Why should we be surprised?" Tyrion asked, "The love you bear for the King's sister is hardly a secret. In fact, I heard a minstrel in a Steel Street tavern just the other day singing about it, as I happened to be passing. He received quite a lot of money, actually."

Gendry ignored him, and sent a tentative question towards Bran, "So you accept my request, Your Grace?"

"Of course, Gendry, why do you think I had your sister brought down from the Vale all those years ago?"

Naturally.

"And who may replace Lord Baratheon as Master of War, your Grace?" Brienne asked.

Tyrion frowned and suggested, "Perhaps a lord of the Vale. Your cousin Robert has been pushing for a Vale representative, your Grace, and I'm afraid he's getting _quite_ insistent."

"Ser Morton Waynwood of Ironoaks would be an adequate choice, then."

And so it was done. Gendry tried not to be too bitter about how easily they had replaced him.

* * *

Ravens were sent out, and within two weeks most of the Stormlords had arrived in King's Landing to be shepherded into the rebuilt Great Hall to formally swear allegiance to Mya. If it was the same as before Drogon and Daenerys, Gendry had not a flying fart of a clue, but it was certainly the grandest building he ever had seen.

Gold veins slithered their way down marble pillars and onto marble floors. The room was lit softly with oil lamps, some of the finest smithing work that Gendry had ever seen. The lords and ladies and their offspring were draped in richly dyed fabrics and precious metals, fluttering around the room like bejewelled cockroaches. The sweet perfume from both sexes of the court made Gendry's head throb. It is as if they believed a honeyed smell could mask the poison of this place.

Gods above, he hated court. With satisfaction, he realised this would be the last day he would ever have to spend here.

There was an empty space at the centre of the hall, where Gendry knew the Iron Throne used to be. When the King held court, such as now, he always remained seated in his wheeled wooden chair. It was a breath of fresh simplicity in a place of overbearing grandeur.

The contradiction was apt for their King. For how could it not be? He was neither a drunk nor a whoremonger, nor cruel, vain, or mad. He was almost always present to hear complaints and requests from highborn and lowborn alike, and his judgements and decisions had a strange way of working for the best eventually. He listened to people, and was listened to in return.

In short, Brandon was unlike any monarch King's Landing could remember, and it unnerved people.

That being said, the stained glass window behind the dais was anything but subtle. A giant, grey wolf with doleful eyes lounged at the base of a heart tree, and a screaming face dripping blood-red sap was carved into the tree's trunk. A murder of crows crowded its branches.

Coming back to the present, Gendry stood on the dais to the right of Bran's throne, itching in his gold-threaded clothes. Mya had knelt before them.

"... and finally, do you swear to uphold your duties to the people of the Stormlands, from the Kingswood to the Dornish marches?"

"I, Mya of House Baratheon, do so swear."

"Then rise as Lady Mya Baratheon of Storm's End, Lady Paramount of the Stormlands. You will now join us on the dais to take the oaths of your bannermen."

Ormund led the cheers of the Stormlanders, raucous as they were, and Gendry knew then that everything would be alright.

* * *

The following morning, Mya, Ormund, Pod, and Tyrion accompanied him down to the harbour. The goodbyes were as he expected – that is, they didn't feel like goodbyes at all. For better or for worst, these were the people that had shaped the man he had become.

"You know," Tyrion said to him, "Davos is going to be awfully put out with you that you didn't say goodbye to him. He's going to take out his heartbreak on me, and I'm going to have to calm the poor man down."

Gendry laughed, "He was attending the birth of his first grandchild. Some things are more important than politics."

"I wouldn't know," Tyrion replied with a pained expression, "For an abnormally small man, I seem to get myself into some abnormally large games."

Gendry snorted, and clasped Tyrion on the shoulder, "Take care, my friend. Stay safe."

The ship left soon after, and Gendry strained his eyesight to see as their figures were eaten up by the horizon. Then, he was alone with nothing but the boundless sea.

His excitement grew.


	4. Winterfell

The ship was going from King's Landing to Gulltown, from Gulltown to White Harbour, he was told. If the weather was fair and if they could restock quickly at Gulltown, the voyage could be as short as a sennight and a half. If not, then closer to a fortnight.

Either way, it was a good deal quicker than the month it would take for Gendry to travel overland on the Kingsroad, not even accounting for the possibility of bandits on the roads. When he finally arrived, his quiet palfrey would be better rested and fed once they did reach their destination.

But despite Gendry's benevolent apathy for the length of the voyage, the information was told to Gendry apologetically and with a good deal of genuflection. It is an old boat, he was told, and not as fast as some of those newer ones...the winds were a hindrance, this time of year...if only the Lord Baratheon had given them greater notice before procuring their services...

Finally Gendry had dismissed the man, thoroughly irritated.

Aside from the off chance of pirates, the only downside to such a trip was that Gendry, for the first time in months, was now completely alone with his thoughts. Which was exactly the opposite of what he wanted.

Because in the silence, the boy's face crept back. Gendry hadn't even known the lad that well, he had only served Gendry for a matter of months, and had spent most of his training with Ormund.

Yet he had been Gendry's responsibility, and he had failed his duty. Small details were branded into Gendry's mind – how lifeless Duncan's eyes had been, or how the boy's body had reeked after the days of sunny seas. How his parents and younger siblings and extended family had looked during the funeral, solemn eyes against the wooded rivers and jutting cliffs of Gallowsgrey.

The worst part was that nobody had blamed Gendry. Instead they gave him sympathy, and deep gratitude for returning the body of their son and grandson, nephew and cousin to his rightful resting place. Duncan's grandfather, the current Lord Trant, had taken him aside to personally thank him for doing them great honour by attending, and to ask if Gendry had since taken another squire.

Gendry had replied that he hadn't, and by supper that night, another young boy was placed near Gendry. Duncan's cousin, he was told, and a better swordsman at thirteen namedays than Duncan ever had been.

For them, it hadn't mattered that another Trant boy had been killed under his watch – the allure of having a son of House Trant growing under the eye of a Lord Paramount was too much. Revulsion had churned Gendry's gut, and his plate had been untouched for the rest of the night. He had made his excuses the next day, and had fled back to Storm's End and its somber ramparts.

With all that going through Gendry's mind, and with absolutely no way to be useful or busy on the ship, suddenly the prospect of a fortnight on the Narrow Sea seemed too long.

* * *

The trip seemed to stretch for a year rather than a fortnight, but finally Gendry caught the colossal pale walls of White Harbour breaking upwards from the coastline. They were of a height to easily rival the walls of King's Landing, and certainly larger than Winterfell's. Gendry's second thought, after marvelling how tall they were, was to make a grumpy list of the many ways the Long Night would have been better if they had fought here instead.

Originally they had been headed for the inner harbour, smaller than the outer harbour but protected by the Seal Gate and with much better anchorage. It was the place where the well-to-do merchants and highborns would be expected to dock, as it was a shorter ride to the New Castle.

Instead, Gendry had told the captain to deposit him at the outer harbour docks, nestled between the protection of the heavily guarded Seal Rock and the city gates. It was where the fishmarkets were, and where a common man might be able to find passage up the White Knife.

Because a common man Gendry was now. During their trip he had realised that to travel alone as a Southron highborn with heavy purses would perhaps not be the smartest option. Mentally, he had booted himself in the arse, to be precise. In his rush to become the perfect lord, he had forgotten the ways of his own people. He was practically asking to be robbed, dressed as he was.

Therefore he was now Stevron Waters, a man from noble stock, but fallen into hard times. Reluctantly, Gendry made himself look the part. He had sold his horse for a depressing price to the gleeful captain, who no doubt would sell the fine palfrey for much more money than for what he had bought it, and Gendry had taken the spare clothing of the captain's as well. It was warm and of fine make, but not too fine as to attract attention. The cloak and the outer tunic would do well to hide the secondary, larger purse he had strapped silent to his person. The outer purse on his belt only contained pennies, copper stars, and one, gleaming silver stag.

Nevertheless, he could not bring himself to part with his weapons for ones of cheaper, more inconspicuous make. Not for the first time was he thankful that he wasn't the type of lord that decorated his weapons with precious metals and jewels. Just plain, good leather and beautiful castle-forged steel. He just hoped that the warhammer on his back and sword on his belt was enough to convince any would-be thieves or murderers that he was not worth the trouble. On that, his height and the size of his muscles aided him well.

The sailors aboard no doubt thought him odd, exiting the boat looking like a sellsword, but they said nothing. Gendry practically leaped from the gangway, only to halt suddenly when a wave of dizziness came over him, his body not used to solid ground. The sailors around him chuckled.

When the world eventually righted itself, Gendry looked around. Everywhere, there was noise. From the crash of waves as they hit the docks, to the cry of gulls as they crowded fishing boats, begging for scraps, to the roar of vendors everywhere as they entreated the milling crowds.

It was a noise to quiet the mind, and Gendry sighed with relief, at ease once more. Although the smell was rank – rotting fish guts and whale oil no doubt comprising a large part of it. Steading himself, he set off to find passage to Winterfell.

Finding a barge to take him up the White Knife was perhaps the easiest part of this whole journey so far. For the extortionate rate of five copper stars, Gendry was packed onto a small deck with two merchants, out of the way of the crew comprising of a grand total of five men.

It was a higher price, he was told, because the summer meltwater made the river engorged and difficult to navigate. Gendry was inclined to believe them, until one of the merchants told him he only ever paid two copper stars on the White Knife.

"'Tis because you're a Southroner, and there is nothin' you can do about _that_." The man had let him know generously, as if a great tragedy had befallen Gendry. He had made a small fuss about the price, because it was expected, but had otherwise let it go.

He had also pretended to not see the skeletons of great, bulging ships amassed around the second river bend. Whatever was being built was significant, but Gendry had neither the knowledge nor the time to care what. He would ask Arya about it when he arrived in Winterfell, although not for the first time did he wonder how big the Northern Fleet actually was, as opposed to the intelligence the Small Council had received.

Again his mind drifted back to Arya. As always, excitement and longing was mixed a little with apprehension and dread. He didn't know how she would react to him arriving, and he hadn't thought to send her a raven to let her know. He just had to assume it would all work out, and let the winds blow where they may.

On the second of a three-day trip, the old captain seemed to finally have forgiven Gendry for the stain of not being Northern. Perhaps he was the best of a bad lot, out of the two chattering merchants, four roughhousing deckhands, and three aged nags that were being used as packhorses.

"To Winterfell, lad?"

"Aye." Gendry answered, but his conscious mind was elsewhere.

The withered fisherman nodded solemnly, "You best be respectful about the townfolk if you do, boy. Dark words out of Winterfell."

Gendry startled, now paying attention to the conversation. Dread crept in, "Dark words?"

"Aye, good Queen Sansa has lost her babe in childbirth. Would have been a brother for bonnie Prince Rickard, I'm told. Everyone grieves with the poor lass...the Old Gods can be cruel even to the ones they favour."

Gendry sat back against the boat and closed his eyes for a moment, heartsore. "I'm sorry to hear that. Queen Sansa, of all people, does not deserve such a tragedy."

He pictured Arya and Sansa, and the small, red-headed boy that would be Sansa's only child, standing over the crypt of a babe. He knew it was common for women to lose their children, but how much more sorrow did one family deserve?

The old man looked back to him, and for the first time approval was in his voice, "Aye, she does not. But she's a survivor, that one. After all, she's a Stark. The gods build 'em strong."

With that, Gendry could most heartily agree.

* * *

By dusk on the third day, they had reached a medium-sized village where the Kingsroad met the White Knife. There, he departed and gave the old captain more copper stars for one of his old nags. Surprisingly, the man gave the horse to him for only two copper stars, although the guilt was clear on the man's face so Gendry guessed it evened out with the expense of his previous fee. Gendry started the journey north, silence once again his cursed companion.

It certainly wasn't as cold as he last remembered it, and the snow was gone to make way for a green landscape rolling into muted heaths and distant, ancient woods for as far as the eye could see. There was also a bloody large amount of bogs that had sprung from the melting summer snows, as Gendry learned the hard way when he had dismounted to make camp in the evening. His boots would likely not be salvageable.

There was an eerie feel to the land, grey skies bleaching the colour from his surroundings as he plodded along, seeming in this very moment to be the only person in whole of the North. Occasionally he would encounter other travellers in large groups or caravans, but they gave him a wide berth when they spotted his weapons and rough appearance. Often he would smell the wood smoke of a far-off village, still twice already he had come across ruins of abandoned dwellings, never reoccupied after the Long Night.

After two full days travel, he crested a hill to see Winterfell in the distance. It rose from the moorlands like a slumbering giant, and he looked to its side to see the ruby crown of the godswood. Nostalgia struck him deep. Those scant months spent in Winterfell's chaotic forge had been the closest he has ever felt to true belonging.

He rode through Wintertown as if he were in a dream, one he was hurtled from abruptly when he looked down to see a woman in furs wrinkling her nose at him and his tired nag.

He looked down, and made a face. Mud smeared up his breeches and had flecked over his coat, courtesy of the many more bogs he had unwittingly encountered. His hair was shaggy and his beard more so after three weeks of travelling.

Gendry decided he couldn't present himself to Queen Sansa and Winterfell's court like this, and certainly not to Arya, although he doubted she would care. He could feel the cold rising as day gave way to the night. Sighing, he surrendered the idea of seeing Arya today, and found the closest tavern.

There was a stableboy at the front who took his nag. The boy looked between him and the horse in surprise, but wisely held whatever he was about to say. Something cheeky about the size of Gendry against the size of the old mare, no doubt.

He entered the tavern and took in the place. Immediately the smell of roasting mutton besieged his nose, a tin tray beneath collecting the drippings. The smell was heavenly, and Gendry's stomach growled at the thought of sinking his teeth in. All around him were people, tables were crowded with loud, merry customers, seeking the protection of ale and a warm fire to keep them from the night's frost.

"Can I help you, goodman?" A strong, feminine voice called from behind him. Gendry turned to see a portly woman squeezing her way between people crowding a table, a drunken arm-wrestling match sprawling in the centre.

She stopped suddenly, and looked him up and down. He could see her taking in his sword belt, glancing at the finely-forged and lethal hammer peeking over his shoulder, and his muddy but finely-made clothes. A curtain fell over her face, and she asked again, slower and more cautious, "Or is it a Ser, or a lord?"

"Just Stevron will be fine, mistress," He said, and saw her visibly relax. The thought brought him some uneasy memories– it was well known that petty lordlings and rowdy knights were the bane of anyone with the ill-fortune of being common-born. He continued, "I was wondering if there were spare rooms available for tonight. I can pay good coin for it."

A pained look crossed her face, "I have no doubt of that, Ser Stevron, but we are already full for the night, and I am not a woman to push paying folk out on their bums for a bit more coin, begging your pardon."

She had obviously decided he was highborn after all, whether it was from the manner of his standing or his speech. He really had changed, then. He used to make fun of pretentious twats like that. A half-smile quirked his lips. "Please, don't be troubled. Would you be able to point me in the direction of any other taverns or places where I could stay the night, and pay for a good meal and a bath?"

She rubbed her chin thoughtfully, then swatted away a man who tried to approach; another barkeep from the looks of it. She scrunched up her face in the way people do before they give bad news, "Almost all will be full, Ser Stevron, with folk travelling to Winterfell from all over to celebrate the coming of a new Stark, though 'tis all for naught now." She shook her head, and said almost to herself, "May the gods bring mercy to that babe and his poor mother."

After those few moments of bleakness, her tone uplifted, "I do know of a family, though, with room and clean bedding, who would be grateful for the coin. They would treat you and feed you as well as their own."

She said it carefully, looking him up-and-down once more, as if assessing his worthiness. Gendry didn't blame her – he certainly wouldn't recommend a man who looked like him to board with a family.

If he were a poorer man, Gendry might check other taverns for availability first before accepting, to see if he were being taken advantage of. But he was too tired to be suspicious, and too cold, so with a small smile Gendry said, "If I could leave my horse in your stables, I would be very grateful to take the offer."

The woman returned the smile, which was much warmer than his own, "The family is that of Brynna, my sister. Her son works here as one of the stableboys. I'll have him take you home."

Soon Gendry was following that same boy with the cheeky grin through narrow alleyways, and he realised mournfully that he would never get his mutton.

* * *

The family was pleasant, and certainly better off than he expected. They had wooden floors instead of dirt ones, a tiled roof, and a bricked hearth. There were even several bedrooms, filled with the family's seven children, although they had squeezed them all into one room so Gendry could have his own. Once he would have thought this house to be the ultimate luxury. Well as much as one could, anyway, when you grew up in the shadow of the Red Keep.

The man of the house, a cloth merchant named Stephan, had tripped over himself to welcome him. Obviously the tavern-owner had told her sister about her assumptions of Gendry's status, and the family treated him as if he were the Southron king himself come to grace their bloody table.

By the time Gendry had taken a small basin of hot water into the room, lathered and washed himself with a small cake of soap and had trimmed his beard and hair, supper was being served. It consisted of freshly-baked brown bread and a thick, meaty stew. Gendry had patted his stomach afterwards, happy and thoroughly satisfied.

"We are well-used to Southern customs," Stepan had told Gendry knowingly, "Being a successful cloth merchant myself with many journeys to the South, we can show you a hospitality better suited to your tastes than most in the North." Gendry didn't like the smug, superior tone, but held his tongue and let the man have his misplaced pride.

But after the meal, the inevitable question had come.

"So what brings you to Winterfell, Ser Stevron?" Stephan's second-eldest daughter flashed her doe eyes coquettishly at him. The girl was fifteen if she were a day. Gendry ignored her stares.

"I intended to go to Winterfell castle to see old friends, but I arrived in much need of a wash." Gendry laughed, "I didn't want to be turned away at the gates."

"Friends in the castle?" Stephan asked with a light in his eye.

Gendry nodded carefully, "I fought with them at Winterfell during the Long Night, and later at King's Landing."

"My brother did also, for King Jon. I would have joined him, but we had fled to the refugee camps at the Neck by that point, as had many in the North. I didn't want Brynna giving birth amongst slaughter." He paused, lips pursed, "Who did you fight for, Ser Stevron, the Starks or the Dragon Queen?"

Thankfully, Gendry avoided that loaded question when the stableboy interrupted excitedly, "Did you see Daenerys Targaryen's dragons? Were they really that big? Did King Jon really ride Rhaegal?"

Gendry laughed and lifted his eyebrows at the onslaught, "Aye, words cannot describe how big they were. Winterfell would have been lost against the wights without Daenerys and her dragonfire." Gendry's mirth died, "Though King's Landing might have been saved."

"That's the Targaryen madness for you." One of the sons said, a perfect imitation of his father.

His jaw clenched. It was difficult, when the subject of Queen Daenerys was brought up. His first instinct was always to defend her. He had later realised that there had been ulterior motives at play; pieces that Daenerys had wanted moved around on the board, but still, he would have been nothing without her legitimisation. More likely, he would have been long dead by the hands of a hundred thousand wights.

She had been a saviour, and a destroyer, and Gendry still couldn't quite reconcile the two.

"But King Jon's real name is actually Aegon Targaryen," The youngest girl pointed out stubbornly, "He is the Last Dragon, and _he_ isn't mad."

"King Jon is more a Stark than he ever was a dragon," her oldest sister replied with a disapproving scowl, "His Northern blood is stronger. As it should be."

It was very interesting, Gendry thought, that they still referred to Jon as King even when it was clear how much they loved their Queen. A part of him had expected Jon's name to be hated here, for giving away the North to Daenerys. It went to show how little he truly understood the North.

More interesting was the reminder this exchange gave him, something he had forgotten over the years, in the way the Starks seemed to walk the North like bloody gods... albeit annoying and very murderous gods. A dry smile broke, and Gendry rejoined the conversation playfully, "I don't know...anyone who decides to hop on a dragon for fun would have to be pretty mad."

The children giggled, and their parents looked at him appreciatively. After a brief lull, Brynna spoke, "Have you heard the news out of Winterfell, then?"

Gendry nodded, "Your sister told me. I wish with everything that the gods had let Sansa's babe live."

In hindsight, it was a mistake. He shouldn't have referred to her by only her first name, and with such familiarity. It startled Stephan and Brynna, and the light in their eyes was beginning to grow suspicious.

The middle daughter snatched his attention back, "It was strange, though, Ser Stevron."

He turned, "What was?"

She turned to the entire table, voiced hushed and dramatic, "Well, Bertha the maid _swore_ on the Old Gods themselves she heard a babe crying, right after they told everyone Queen Sansa's child had been stillborn. It was eerie, gave us all the willies when we was told."

Another brother replied with a thick accent, "Aye, Joane, well everyone knows that Winterfell is haunted by the Starks whom have passed over. Old Wyllard the guard told me just last year that he saw Ned Stark's ghost in the halls outside his and Lady Catelyn's old chambers, now the Queen's chambers. They say the Starks come up from the crypts at the wolf hour to watch over their livin' kin, and that 'tis why only Starks are allowed down there, lest the gods and the dead alike are offended."

Brynna tutted, "At least the poor babe is with his kin now, cared for and beloved."

Gendry went to bed that night and dreamt of a crying babe. He saw Sansa standing in the crypts over the open coffin of her dead child's body, but when he looked down it was Duncan buried there instead, eyes pecked away by crows and blood long since dried into a sick brown.

* * *

He woke with the family early the next morning. To his surprise, he had found that Brynna had washed his outer clothes in the night. He almost looked proper now. After breakfast, Gendry had gratefully given them more money than was owed, and wished them well.

Stephan caught him on the way out, the morning air giving way to people in their duties weaving about on the streets.

"Yes?" Gendry asked.

Stephan pursed his lips, "Brynna and me didn't say anything about it last night – didn't want to overexcite the children – but we had a question about your name."

"Yes?" Gendry asked again slowly, but frowned as the man shifted from side to side, wringing his hands.

In a hushed voice, he said, "Not meaning to offend, but we've come to suspect your name isn't what you say it is, Ser."

Not particularly a question, but that was just Gendry being petty. He didn't really care that he had been found out, either. The name was only to get him to Winterfell, and it had served its purpose. It would be a relief to get rid of the lie. "No offense is given, goodman." Gendry shrugged, "And perhaps you are right. If you were, I might apologise. They say it's better to be cautious than trusting."

"Aye, that is certainly true." Eyes wide, the man asked with slow deliberation, "Would your name be one that we...recognise?"

Gendry clicked his tongue in thought, "Truly, I don't know. It is possible. If we were in the South I would say yes, but the North has its own ways."

He could see Stephan processing this, and Gendry took advantage of the situation to say his thanks and goodbyes again. With that, he gave the man no more room for conversation, and made his way as quickly back to the tavern stables as possible.

* * *

He had ended up selling the old nag to the tavern keeper as a packhorse, and walked to Winterfell on foot. He entered through the South Gate alongside other servants, messengers, merchants, and smiths. The forges were directly to Gendry's left as he entered, and he could feel the heat even from here. He resisted the strong urge to go and see what his former home had become. Only just, though.

Gendry crossed the courtyard, with the walls guarding the Great Hall and the Great Keep to his right. Everywhere, people moved with horses, carts, and weapons, and Gendry laughed at himself as he dodged around them like a green squire around great knights.

Suddenly at a loss for what to do next, Gendry caught the attention of a passing washerwoman, and put on his best northern accent, "Excuse me, I need to see Commander Arya on important business from Deepwood Motte. Do you know where I could find her?"

It sounded horrendous to Gendry's ears, but it must have been fairly passable, because the woman shrugged him off with a annoyed huff and said, "I saw her heading to the Godswood."

Gendry let her pass, and stared up ahead. The main entrance to the godswood was the iron gate next to the guard hall. It was guarded and damn near impossible to get through unless you had the right name.

Gendry casually crossed the courtyard and slipped under the cover of one of the balconies, weaving through the chaotic energy of the kitchen and its own small courtyard until he found the entrance of the hunter's gate. Nestled between the gate and Winterfell's kennels was a small wooden door in the stone walls surrounding the godswood. If you didn't know where to look, it could almost be forgotten.

Gingerly, Gendry stopped before the door. The latch creaked open, and Gendry slipped inside, heart high in his throat and breath strained. He walked forward on the small path through woods so thick they blotted out the morning sun, the crowns of the trees rustling with light winds.

And there, just up in the clearing ahead, was a figure sitting beneath the weirwood. They were sharpening their sword, rasps echoing across the waters of the hot springs.

A twig snapped beneath Gendry's foot, and the head shot up. Even from here he could see those thick brows knit in confusion.

"Gendry?"

* * *

A/N: Chapter four, also known as the one with the fillers, easter eggs, and a (tiny) cliffhanger. Again, thanks for all your support!


	5. The Queen

He was a man fully grown, battle-tried and tested, and yet standing before his oldest friend, he was reduced once more to a bumbling cock.

She looked good, better than she had at the Banefort. She certainly looked the part of a highborn, if not necessarily a highborn lady. Her clothing was fine, dyed a rich blue that must have cost a godscurst fortune. Even from the distance that he was standing, he could see her tunic was heavily embroidered with running direwolves and heart trees and other symbols of the North.

Her face was another matter. There was new bruising across her right eye, swollen to give her a bulbous look, and it bloomed brilliant purples and greens and yellows. The trove of bruises was crowned by a jagged slash, and Gendry couldn't help but wonder who she had insulted this time. Probably someone taller than her, Gendry mused, although that certainly didn't narrow the list.

Then he almost laughed out loud, realising what she had done to her hair. Her plait had reached her mid-back last he saw her, and yet now in was cut at her jawline. It was rough, choppy work, and he wouldn't be surprised it was the result of Arya getting frustrated with the length and lopping it off with her Needle. Either that or the butcher's boy did it.

"If you're done gawking like an idiot, can you tell me what you're doing here?"

Gendry was drawn out of his thoughts, and he gut lurched as he centred on Arya's cold, blank face. Her shoulders were tense, though, and her gloved hands gripped the log tightly.

He had planned in meticulous detail the things he was going to say to Arya when he saw her. He had convinced himself over and over that it would be different than the last time he was at Winterfell. He had debated on being calm, or a half-dozen other options to explain to her why he had come north, but looking at her now with her expression reminiscent of trapped game, Gendry instead blurted, "Who cut your hair?"

Her shoulders dropped and she drew back her head, offended, "_Who cut my hair?_"

He winced inwardly, then shrugged in an offbeat manner, as if it didn't matter to him. He decided then and there to not say anything else until he recovered his traitorous fucking tongue. She dropped her sword to the side of the great log and rose slowly, "You appear at my home without even _mentioning _that you were coming to the North and the first thing you say to me is to ask _who cut my hair_?"

"...Yes?"

She had taken a few steps towards him, but now seemed determined to take no more, face incredulous. Vaguely frustrated, Gendry closed the gap. She didn't move away, but stood tense once more and completely unmoving. He took the opportunity to reach out and brush one of her locks, lightly curling it around one of his fingers.

Still she said nothing, only stared.

There was so much between them, but Gendry had no idea what to say to her. Her face had returned to blank slate, with no clue as to her feelings, and he had no way to guarantee she wouldn't turn him away with a pitying smile like last time. The thought terrified him.

In his desperation to lighten the air, he forgot his vow of silence instantly. He tilted his head at her and said teasingly, "It looks as if someone shut their eyes and cut it with a blunt blade."

The effect was instantaneous. Her face transformed into a deep scowl, brows drawn into thunderous clouds, and swatted his hand away from her hair. Gendry grinned like a child who had just gotten away with something. Crossly, she opened her mouth to speak, but a rustling sound form the other side of the clearing made them both startle.

"Your Highness, we had word that a unknown man was seen entering –"

The guard drew to an abrupt halt, gaze flicking back and forth between the two of them.

To an outsider's eye, Gendry guessed the picture would seem compromising. An armed, grinning stranger stood almost chest to chest with their princess, who looked moments away from stabbing him, in the woods meant only for the royal family and their guests.

"Do...Do you need assistance, your Highness?"

Seemingly reluctant to stop glaring at Gendry, she rounded on the soldier and said in a voice dripping with sarcasm, "Do you think I need your assistance?"

"I might, though," Gendry muttered in an undertone, which to his dismay carried in the silent wood to both the guard and Arya.

She looked at Gendry. "Yes," she calmly agreed, although her eyes were anything but calm, before she turned back to the guard.

It took a few moments, but the man eventually seemed to remember that he was speaking to _the_ Arya Stark. His eyes widened, and his stutter got worse, "Of course not, your Highness."

Still he hovered. Arya waved her hand with impatience, "Was there anything else you wanted to say?"

The man swallowed, "The Queen requests your presence, and—and the stranger's as well, when we found him."

"Ah," Arya said caustically, "So that's how you knew there was an intruder, not because any of you were actually doing your jobs. I did wonder."

Gendry glanced at her with reproach, but she hadn't seen. He hated that godscurst ability of hers to make a person feel miniscule just with the tone of her voice; it had always been the most highborn thing about her.

Sighing, Gendry reviewed his options then – staying in the godswood with Arya and her murderous eyes and likely even more murderous intentions, or following the guard to meet the Queen. Sansa might possibly arrest him, true enough, but at least she would leave him bloody alive at the end of the ordeal.

"I should see what the Queen wants, to be polite and give my respects," he told Arya. Gendry nodded to the guard, who nodded back. Bowing to Arya, the guard turned and left, Gendry following him with a spritely step.

"Coward."

He pretended not to hear, though when he glanced behind he saw her trailing after them at a distance.

They exited the godswood via the great iron and oak gate Gendry had seen before. The inner castle walls that guarded the Great Hall and the Great Keep were due ahead. Arya had caught up to them by this point, walking alongside Gendry with not the sound of a single footstep on the leaf-blown dirt.

The entrance to the inner castle held yet another set of guards, these ones seemingly more abrupt about their duties. They demanded Gendry remove his sword and his beloved warhammer. Panicked, Gendry asked Arya, "Is this really necessary? Surely I'm no danger."

Arya gave him a malicious smile, and said in a voice full of fake condolences, "I'm terribly sorry, but you're an uninvited guest in the Queen's castle. Who knows what foul intentions you have?"

Clearly she was enjoying this moment of revenge too much. She motioned to the guards, who approached Gendry in an aggressive stride.

"Alright! Alright!" Gendry said, stripping his sheathed sword, its belt, and the warhammer. He handed them to the guards reluctantly and shivered, feeling more naked than he had since his last bath. Mournfully, he watched as one guard carried them to another hall. He wondered when he would see them again.

"Oh, stop whimpering like a babe."

"Shut the hells up, Arya," He grumbled, earning scandalised looks from the guard.

After that, they went on their way unmolested. The yard soon gave way to a set of iron and oak doors that guarded the monstrous stone giant that was Winterfell's Great Hall. It surely rivalled, if not exceeded, the size of the Red Keep's own.

Right before they exited one of the dimly-lit corridors into the hall itself, Gendry stopped abruptly before one of the pieces of artwork that lined the stone walls.

"What it that?" He asked, distracted by the material in front of him. Strange reds and yellows and blacks dotted what appeared to be bark in swirling and waving configurations and contortions. He had never seen such a thing.

The guard gave an impatient curse, but Arya came to Gendry's side. "It's from Northoss, and it's a map. It was the first thing I traded for when we reached an understanding with the Northossi peoples."

Gendry stood for a few moments more, mesmerised. It always had seemed an afterthought that Arya had led one of the most famous exploratory expeditions in Westerosi history, discovering an entire new continent and helping to create an exclusive trade network that had forged the bulk of the North's new wealth. It was likely the reason why they could afford to finance a new fleet, and Gendry had little doubt her name would be recognised and revered a hundred, three hundred years from now. Another thing they lacked in common.

"Sorry," he said sheepishly to the two waiting Northerners, and finally they entered the Great Hall.

The room was just as warm as he remembered, heated by the hot springs underneath Winterfell. However, the room had been cleared of benches to give way for a line of lowborn and nobles alike, seemingly in the middle of making petitions and airing their grievances to their Queen.

From the back of the room, Gendry could see Sansa seated on tall throne made of white wood and black iron. Weirwood, he realised with a start. He had never seen her crowned before, but from this distance he could make out a thin band of dark metal winding across her bright hair.

She looked every inch a ruler, and suddenly nervous, Gendry said to Arya, "We can come back another time, you know. When she isn't busy."

Arya snickered, "You were the one who wanted to come meet my sister now, remember?"

"I've suddenly changed my mind."

He didn't necessarily like the court at the Red Keep or his own smaller one at Storm's End, true enough, and he had never been able to keep up with the games that the highborns liked to play, but nonetheless the courts had been his. Whether or not he had been worthy, Gendry had held power, and he had grown used to it enough that he had no problem making his voice heard and obeyed.

Here was another matter entirely. The looming and airy Great Hall of the Red Keep gave way to the vast, empty stone space that was Winterfell's Great Hall. He watched as the guard who had guided him approached one of Sansa's advisors, whose white-bearded face shot to where Gendry and Arya were standing, who then hurriedly approached the Queen. After bowing deeply, he whispered in her ear.

Sansa nodded and said something back to him, and the advisor thrust his shoulder back, emphasising his barrel chest, and bellowed over the crowd, "Our Queen requests a word with her sister, the Princess Arya, and her dear friend, Ser Gendry Baratheon, former Lord Paramount of the Stormlands and hero of the Long Night. You may wait for Her Grace, who will hear all petitions and disputes afterwards, elsewise Maester Rayce will hold session on the morrow at the hour of the horse."

The whispers were deafening as they strode past the people gathered. He could hear his name on dozens of lips, and wondered once more if the name had meaning here in the North.

"Former?" Arya hissed at him as they walked, "What does she mean by 'former'?"

Gendry refused to look at her, "That might be one of the things I needed to discuss with you."

She said nothing more, but Gendry knew her too well to think the matter was over. Now before Sansa, Gendry descended to one knee. "Your Grace, thank you for so generously allowing me into your home. I'm overjoyed to be in Winterfell once more, and even more overjoyed to see it whole again."

He knew he sounded like a pompous arse, and Arya's snort confirmed it, but they were the words that had to be said before kings and queens. There were a few moments of silence before Sansa answered in a measured tone, "I am likewise happy to have you once again in our fold, Ser, and hope you will cherish your time at Winterfell."

With the tedious stuff out of the way, Sansa rose from her throne and there was a shuffling sound as the whole room knelt.

"I am eager to have words with my beloved sister and our old friend, and so I thank you all for your patience."

With that, she walked toward the door to the side of the dais. Everyone rose, and Gendry hastily followed Arya as she moved after her sister. The door led to another passageway, and Arya led him into a small, intimate chamber where Sansa had already sat down, pouring water from a jug into three ornate glass cups. His eye twitched, and he wondered if maybe he should be checking for poison.

Luckily it seemed to be an informal meeting, as Arya hadn't bothered acknowledging her sister before she took the back of one of the finely-polished redwood chairs and sat. Gendry followed suit, slightly wary.

His arse cheeks barely touched the seat before Arya snapped to Sansa, "What the fuck did you mean, 'the former Lord Paramount'?"

Sansa clasped her hands and raised a cool brow at Gendry, who grimaced and admitted, "I thought the news would have reached Winterfell before I arrived."

Sansa gave a thin smile, "You'll find no such luck. My sister has only just returned from Deepwood Motte, where news from the capitol is slower to reach, and even then she neglects her letters."

"Stop talking around me and answer the question," Arya butted in with an irate voice. "And leave my letters out of it, Sansa."

Sansa turned to her sister, something angry behind her eyes, "I think you'll find Ser Gendry can answer your question for himself."

"Fine."

Suddenly he was at the end of two Stark stares, an intimidating thing for any sane person. Finding his manhood in a deep, steadying breath, he said to Arya, "I abdicated to my sister some time ago. Your brother named her Lady Paramount."

Arya looked stupefied, and asked, "Why in the seven hells would you do that?"

His mind drew a blank. He had been telling himself for so long that Arya was the reason he left. But now standing here in front of her, he realised with surprise it wasn't necessarily the only reason, and it certainly wasn't the reason he wanted to admit to Arya.

"Gendry," Arya asked again with searching eyes, considerably calmer, "Why did you come here?"

"I didn't want to be a lord anymore," he replied with a nonchalant wave.

Arya drew back, and with a suspicious lilt to her voice asked, "So you just packed up and came to the North. And I had nothing to do with it?"

"No?"

Arya had no time to respond, because Sansa put her glass of water down and coughed violently into her hand. After a moment she came out of her fit with a small smile. She was laughing at them.

"It's a shame you didn't choke more," Arya told her primly, and Gendry could sympathise.

He tapped his foot to let up some nervous energy as an awkward quiet descended on them, leaving Sansa to seemingly pick up the reins. Ignoring Arya's comment, she said changed the direction of the conversation, "Your sister has told me of how bravely you fought in the Westerlands."

Gendry started, "Mya writes to you?"

Sansa looked amused, "As have I to her, since the end of the wars. She was one of the only people to be kind to me at the Eyrie, and I loved her dearly for it."

It took some moments to process that. Of course, Mya had told him the story too many times, but she certainly never mentioned she exchanged bloody ravens with the Northern Queen. He wondered what they talked about, if it was matters of politics or if it was such things as which guard or huntsman had caught their fancy.

"She has been a great comfort to me, in these terrible past weeks. My greatest support, I would dare say."

So their bond went deeper than idle fancies or politics, apparently.

"I was meaning to say, Your Grace, how deeply sorry I was to hear of your loss." His eyes found the floor, but not quickly enough that he missed the curious way in which Sansa had almost threw the words at Arya like a challenge, one that Arya happily accepted.

"Yes, your Grace," Arya mimicked in a sing-song voice beside him, "I'm deeply sorry to hear of your loss. But then, you always _have_ been good at getting rid of unwanted family."

Shock reared through him, "Seven fucking hells, Arya! Apologise!"

Arya looked mutinous, and glared at her sister. Her sister glared back across the table, her mouth drawn in tight. "Yes, Arya. _Apologise_."

He was stunned to hear a quaver in the queen's voice. Evidently Arya was too, because she drew back, regret clear on her face.

"I'm sorry," Arya said quietly, "That was cruel. And unfair." After another moment, she mumbled in an even quieter voice, "We should go. Gendry?"

Gendry was still confused as to what had happened, and still angry at Arya for her cruelty. This discussion hadn't been at all what he expected, and his eyes darted back and forth between the two sisters, torn. After a hard stare, Arya snorted and turned. She heaved the door open, and soon her heavy footsteps were echoing down the corridor.

Shit.

"It'll be alright, Gendry." He heard Sansa say as he watched the empty doorframe. "Though thank you for your concern. We all got a bit distracted from the point of this, which was for me to say that you're welcome to stay at Winterfell for as long as you please. My chamberlain is finding you rooms as we speak, and she'll find you when they are ready."

When he met her eyes, he saw Sansa's mask had slipped back into place, as tranquil as a sheltered cove. It left Gendry to wonder if he had imagined the small crack in her composure.

He bowed deeply to her, and thanked her again. He left the room to find Arya, thinking that the Seven had truly made the Stark sisters two sides of the same incomprehensible coin.

He gave up looking for her after an hour. Wherever she was in this godscurst rabbit's warren of a castle, she certainly didn't want to be found, and Gendry had little patience for her at the present in any case.

Suddenly, he was at a lost for what to do. He had no purpose here, no family or friends other than Arya. A sense of doubt begun slithering up his spine, but rather than give into it, Gendry fled to the only place he had ever belonged.

Walking into the sweltering heat of the smithy from the cold outside was like walking into the loving embrace of a mother. The sharp clanging of a hammer on iron and the gritty smell of metal and rank sweat were even more welcome.

The blacksmiths all looked up when he entered, and then steadfastly ignored him. He grinned. Some poor bastard, likely an apprentice, had probably been slapped with the responsibility of taking new orders. Unless he was the bloody Queen in the North herself, the rest of them would pretend as if he were nothing but a particularly robust gust of wind.

Satisfied, he found himself a bench to the side of the entrance and settled, content to lay back and just listen to the bustle around him. The act in itself, finding himself in and around forges, was hardly an uncommon occurrence. It was where he went when his mind was most clouded. When he was a lord, they had called it an eccentricity rather than what it was – plain strangeness.

_But eccentricity is the prerogative of the nobility_, Tyrion had told him indulgently, and repeated it so often that it stuck.

In King's Landing, he preferred Steel Street to the castle smithies. For a silver stag and a word to the right person, Gendry could work on his creations and on finetuning his warhammer in relative peace. Unless Bran or Tyrion really wanted something, in which case he would find himself being dragged back to the Red Keep by his feet by a squad of hapless guards.

At Storm's End, the forges were considerably smaller than the ones in King's Landing or in Winterfell. While he was happy with his lot at Storm's End – it was still a fine smithy after all – he had often been wistful about the North.

He opened his eyes at the shuffling of feet. A young man drawled in a monotone, "Can I help you today with any products, goodman?"

Clearly gossip hadn't reached here yet of the Queen welcoming another Southron noble to Winterfell's court, and so Gendry quickly considered a reason to be here, and then raked his mind for names of the men he served with during the War for the Dawn. Eventually a name drifted to the surface. "Does Davyn still work here?"

The apprentice finally broke from his bored, placid look, and frowned. Gendry felt himself being evaluated, assessed, and Gendry raised an amused eyebrow in response. Finally the boy asked, now curious, "Yes, he's the castle's head blacksmith. He's currently dealing with important matters at Castle Cerwyn, but should be back by the eve. Can I ask your business?"

"No."

The lad evidently mistook the answer for meaning that he had business that was above a blacksmith's apprentice, and Gendry didn't correct him. The boy mumbled something, and walked away. Gendry settled back into his bench seat, and promptly fell asleep in the cocooning heat.

He woke to a stranger shaking him.

"What in the fucking Seven hells do you want?" Gendry mumbled blearily, thoroughly irritated.

The older woman in front of him hissed in distain. "Southroners," she muttered, shaking her head and making it sound like a curse. She met his eyes and said in an insultingly over-enunciated voice, "I am Queen Sansa's personal chamberlain. Her Grace tasked me with providing you rooms for your...stay. What I want unfortunately has nothing to do with it, or else I would have sent a maid to search high and low for you all over the castle instead."

Gendry winced, and said more than a little guiltily, "Sorry. You startled me, is all."

The woman huffed, "Well come on then, I have other things to do than play nursemaid for an errant lordling, gods help me."

Meekly, Gendry followed the woman back into the maw of the inner castle walls. A small, petulant part of him screamed that she was overstepping her rank, speaking to him like this. Gendry smothered that voice in disgust, and wondered once more when he had started thinking like a bloody highborn.

He got to his rooms unscathed, which given the woman's hawk eyes, he considered a fine victory. She left him in front of a door with a short nod, and Gendry thanked her.

Maybe she didn't hear him though, because she didn't respond.

The rooms themselves were fine and spacious. There was even a bath in a small, adjoining room, Gendry noted with delight. He set down his bag, and went to reach for his weapons only to remember that they had been kidnapped.

He was fully prepared to march back down to the guards and demand their safe return when he noticed them shining beautifully in the corner of his room. Gendry's hackles lowered, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

Thus the afternoon was spent by Gendry hunting down a maid in the outside corridors and having her bring up enough steaming water to fill the bath to the brim. He might reject the idea of treating servants and common folk with disrespect, but if he couldn't use his status every now and then to get a hot bath, then what was the bloody point?

When the sky begun darkening, Gendry finally crawled out of his now-cold bath to find the towels the tittering maids had left him. They had offered to dry him as well, and had started laughing outright when Gendry had declined, his face flushing bright red.

He had just gotten into a thick pair of breeches and a loose shirt when he heard the door creak.

"The maids are talking about you. Saying the most wicked things, really."

Gendry jumped a foot in the air, and near shrieked, "Why do you have to do that?!"

Arya smirked, "It's not my fault your deaf as an old widow."

He shook his head and sighed, still towelling his damp hair. He needed to cut it shorter. "I looked for you afterwards," he told her.

"I know," was her reply. Because of course she knew. Gendry's previous anger trickled to the forefront.

"So you just let me wander around like an idiot."

"You were going to do that anyway, if your little nap in the smithy is any measure."

Gendry frowned, "You were watching me."

Arya shrugged, and moved across the room to nimbly perch on his bed. She looked at him with a knowledge he didn't like. One that told him that he was predictable – and that she could predict him.

"Are you coming to bed?"

Gendry clicked his tongue at her assuredness, "Actually, I think you'll find that is _my bed_, not yours."

"Fine. Are you coming to _your bed_, with me?" Arya amended, teasing smile in place.

There was still so many things to be angry about, so many things that weren't right with them...with either of them. Gendry could feel the weight of it all building like a sick fever. But he was so tired, too tired to fight and too tired to lose the only friend he had in this strange new world to which he had exiled himself.

So he went to Arya, and he tried to make himself forget. He wondered if, in some way, she was too.

* * *

A/N: I've finally worked up an outline for the rest of the story, which is turning out to be much, much longer than the six-thousand odd fic I started with.

I recently moved this fic over from the ASOIAF community, simply because I couldn't keep deluding myself that including book characters and book plotlines made it a book fic (whoops.)

On the chapter itself, I found it somewhat far-fetched for D&D to turn Arya into Christopher Columbus at the end, but hey, I'm gonna roll with it. The continent of 'Northoss' isn't the Americas per se, and I probably won't expand much on its lore tbh. As for Arya and Gendy themselves - well, their relationship is more than slightly unhealthy at this point, and I'm excited to try and flesh that out further.

Once again, thanks for all the support - your reviews are amazing motivators!


	6. The Feast

He wouldn't have noticed her rise, except she had been coiled around him for the better part of the night. Gendry cracked an eyelid, and groaned, "'Tis not even dawn, Arya. Why are you awake?"

"Training yard. Go back to sleep."

He told himself he should probably go with her. He was sorely out of practice with a blade. But the pillow was whispering sweet nothings to him, and he happily answered its call.

The second time he woke, the sun glowered through the window shutters. He yelped when he saw a pair of dark eyes peering at him from the side of the bed. The knife that had been strapped to his breeches on the floor was almost in his hand by the time he realised that the intruder was but a young boy. He couldn't have been any more than four or five namedays, and Gendry had almost killed him.

He cursed, and flopped back down onto the bed, heart still galloping in his chest.

"Mother says those words are bad."

Gendry threw an evil stare at the boy, "Does your mother also say not to sneak about?"

The boy scowled, and Gendry scowled back at him. He sighed when he realised he was the grown man in this instance, and rose on his elbows to look around for Arya, who was nowhere to be seen. Finally he returned his stare to the boy, dismayed.

"Who are you?" The boy asked bluntly.

"I think the better question is how you got in here."

"The door was open."

Gendry growled, and glanced up at the slightly ajar door. Of course it would be too much for Arya to relock the door when she left. Or even close it.

Suddenly a voice roused from the hallway outside, "Rickard! Where are you?! This is not how good princes behave!"

The boy froze, a rabbit caught in a hawk's sight, and Gendry's jaw dropped. He quickly re-examined his unwelcome visitor, from his freshly combed hair to his immaculate and fine clothing. This boy, with his rosy cheeks and curious eyes, was Rickard Stark, Crown Prince of the North and the light in many a Northerners' eye.

He was a boy who had set many Southron lords sneering because he had been born a bastard, and had remained a bastard for a mere hour before his mother and his uncle had legitimised him across two realms. There were always rumours as to who had sired him. Last Gendry had heard, the current speculation was a lordling of the Vale, but it had been a source of ongoing amusement for many of those highborn fuckers.

Gendry remembered once at the Red Keep, where some House Caron lordling had mused to his toadies with a curled lip, "It was probably one of the rabble. If I had known the she-wolf was offering her services, I would have headed north with my purse."

The quip had been met with sniggers. But unfortunately for the lordling in question, neither Gendry nor Tyrion nor Davos had been out of hearing range. Even to this day, it always brought a smile to Gendry's face when he thought of the look of utter horror on the man's face when he had turned to find not one, but three members of the Small Council bearing down on him. The prick had been sent packing back to the Stormlands by his nervous father before Tyrion could enact any underhanded repercussions, and Gendry had never heard the lordling's friends say another bad word edgewise about the Starks.

In any case, to have the boy in front of him now was strange. He had always imagined the Stark prince to be as bright-haired as his mother was, so to have had that image proven wrong was quite a shock. Gendry glanced back at the door, and opened his mouth.

"Don't dob." Rickard said with all the seriousness that only a child could muster, "Or I'll tell my aunt."

Gendry lifted his brows, and his mouth twitched, "What a terrifying thought. Then I'm at your command, my prince."

The boy nodded solemnly, and they waited in silence till the grumbling nursemaid's footsteps passed. Gendry had thought them in the clear, when the heavy wooden door swung further open, banging roughly on the wall.

Rickard squealed and ran, making for the shelter provided underneath the bed, but he was too slow to escape Arya's reaching arms.

She scooped him up with ease, and held him as he squirmed, still squealing and giggling, "So this is where our lost prince has escaped! He has been hiding out with a cutthroat Southron pirate! Oh the shame! What will my poor sister do?"

Rickard stopped squirming, and popped up over Arya's shoulder to stare at Gendry, eyes wide, "Are you really a pirate?"

Gendry, who had been watching the play with amusement and not a little amount of astonishment, was unexpectedly put on the spot. Looking over at Arya, who nodded encouragement, he blurted out a long-winding, "Yes...?"

"Is that why you tumbled him, Aunt Arry? That's what the maids said you did, anyway."

Gendry's mouth clapped shut in horror, and Arya let an unladylike sound escape her throat. Eyes still full her of mirth, she whispered to the boy, "Don't repeat that to your mother. And it's a secret, but I was holding him captive so he'll tell me the position of the mysterious and bloody Pirate King. Now, you better get back to your nursemaid. I know you're meant to be in your lessons at the moment."

Rickard didn't even look the slightest bit guilty, but whinged when Arya carried him out over her shoulder and hailed the nursemaid back. She kissed him on his head, and said, "I'll see you at supper. You best be good. And stop listening to the maids, they'll give you bad ideas."

The boy gave what were no doubt empty promises, and was led off by the newly-reappeared nursemaid.

Arya turned to stare at him, eyes watering. There was a brief pause, but then they burst out laughing. Gendry laughed until his sides hurt, and it took a long time before they settled again.

He wiped away tears, and Gendry realised he had never seen this Arya before. In general, Arya was more stiff and cold than playful and affectionate. The Arya he knew during the Long Night and since then smiled rarely and even then her smiles never quite met her eyes, her jokes had a malicious intent more often than not, and Gendry couldn't remember the last time they had laughed this hard together. Probably when they were still on the road with Yoren.

But with her nephew, Arya seemed to vibrate with life. He couldn't quite make sense of it, because she always insisted that anything that came along with being a lady she despised, including child-rearing. Maybe it was just this one child. A Stark child. Possibly, Gendry considered, the boy reminded her of her lost brothers, both dead and living.

Absently, he remarked to Arya, "I'd forgotten you'd already told me of his colouring. I keep picturing Sansa's son with red hair and blue eyes."

Arya's lips quirked, "He resembles me more than he does his mother, I think. At least the old Northern bags are happy. Every time they see him, all they seem capable of saying is, 'The gods have surely blessed us, its Ned Stark come again!'"

"Is he? I only ever saw your father that once."

"Still too early to tell." She said with a shrug. The answer was short as it was dismissive.

"And you don't breakfast with your sister?"

"Normally, yes. But we haven't really been on speaking terms as of late."

Gendry snorted, "I hadn't noticed."

Arya didn't say anything in response, and Gendry decided this moment was as good as any.

"Why are the two of you fighting?"

She paused, "Sansa and I have always been at odds over most things. Not as much as when we were children, but still."

"Like what?"

Arya glowered at him, "You're awfully nosy this morning."

Gendry rose from his bed, his bare nakedness feeling the chill despite the shuttered windows and crackling fire. He padded over to her, ignoring his stinging feet as they hit icy stone. Gendry bent down to cradle her chin and to place a chaste kiss on her lips, and knew he wasn't imagining her leaning into him.

"You have terrible breath," she told him.

"Not as bad as yours, and at least I don't smell like the training yard." He drew the conversation back to the previous subject, "You cannot expect me to not be curious after yesterday, Arya."

Her gaze was conflicted. She seemed teetering on the brink of something. Finally, she sighed and replied carefully, "I promised and it's not mine to tell."

Frustration crawled over him, and a hint of anger too. It was not so much the secret itself – whatever it was – that angered him. It was the fact that Arya still did not trust him. That realisation cast a light onto everything between them, such a simple thing, and yet it changed everything.

Arya did not trust him. Perhaps she had never trusted him. He wasn't sure what that meant quite yet, and frankly he didn't want to think about it.

Almost as if she heard his thoughts, Arya announced, "We're going on a hunt today."

It was a perfect distraction, but Gendry grimaced at the idea of him on a horse for an entire day. By choice. For fun.

"What, you don't like hunting or something?" Arya challenged.

"No," Gendry winced, "I love it. Where to?"

"The Wolfswood, of course. We don't have to make it a hunting party. It can just be us, and maybe we can bring back a boar or a stag for the table tonight. I'll have to make sure to bring a pallet or cloth and a draft horse to drag it back, we won't be able to carry it otherwise."

That caught his attention. His brows shot up and he let out a laugh of surprise, "I think I would prefer to be satisfied with a fat rabbit, and live to see the morning. What a story that would be though, two people bringing down a stag without being aided."

Arya huffed, "Right. You can have your rabbit. I'm getting a stag."

They breakfasted, and then set off. The day was beautiful in every regard, just them and the slow-gaited draft horse behind them. Gendry was not a poet by any stretch of the imagination, but even he couldn't ignore Winterfell or its Wolfswood in the Summer, with its ancient woods towering over them in rich greenery and the wild flowers blossoming like the many jewels on a court noble. It had him wandering wide-eyed for a long time, warm despite the chill in the light breeze. Even the smell was different than what he last remembered.

That was until his horse had kicked something, and the clunk it made drew his attention downwards. At first he hadn't realised what he was seeing, but then to his utter horror it dawned on him that it was a human skull.

He must have let out a cry or something, because Arya had quickly wheeled about on her mount.

"Oh," she said, "It that all?"

Gendry looked at her blankly, "It's a skull, Arya. From a dead person."

She shrugged nonchalantly, "I'm surprised it's the first you've seen around here."

"There are more dead people I should be worried about running into?"

Arya looked at him with deep scorn, "It's almost like you forget Winterfell was in a constant state of war for almost seven years. The Others, the Battle of the Bastards, Ramsay Bolton and his hounds, the Ironborn sack... they all happened here. Even if we tried, we would never be able to recover all the dead."

"I didn't forget, I just..." Abruptly solemn, Gendry shook his head, "No, you're right. I did forget. It's just so beautiful here, so peaceful. It's hard to imagine it was once anything else."

"It's beautiful because the plants have had good fertiliser."

Gendry shuddered, and was suddenly eager to leave.

They continued on in silence, as they did for most of the day. A dozen times he opened his mouth to say something, and a dozen times he closed it. He never could think of the right thing to say, and it irritated him like an itch he couldn't reach.

Instead he focused on the hunt – tracking, setting traps... trying to find a sturdy tree to climb if an angry boar charged them. But Gendry need not have worried, because by the late afternoon, they strode back through Winterfell safe and sound.

Arya hadn't gotten her stag, but a large boar occupied the rather small pallet strapped to the labouring draft horse.

They were met with whistles and hoots from the yard when they entered by the hunter's gate, and Gendry felt like a fool when he realised this was likely not the first time Arya had done this. After all, what were a few boars or deer when you had slain the Night King?

"You could have told me you hunted often," Gendry grumbled.

Arya shrugged, "Not often, but often enough. The other hunters have only brought back pigeons, rabbits, and a few small deer, so everyone is happy to have more meat for the feast."

"It seems a tad in excess to have a feast tonight solely to present the boar," Gendry chuckled, "The castle guards and the servants will be so fat they'll need to roll back to their beds."

Arya looked at him strangely. "The feast isn't for them. It's for the party that are arriving tomorrow. Jorelle Mormont, Rodrick Stout, and a few other lords and ladies that could be spared from the western coasts are coming to deliver a few trade issues and defence plans in person."

Gendry didn't care to identify the bitter mix of emotions that rose in him, and he covered them with a simple, "Ah, I see. Well it should make for a good welcome."

There was a pause.

"You're angry," she said.

"No, I'm not," he grunted at her.

"Lie."

Gendry narrowed his eyes at her, "Don't start that Faceless shit with me."

"Then don't lie to me. It's really quite simple."

"I didn't lie to you! Seven hells, _I am not angry_!"

Arya raised her eyebrows at him and snorted, "And now you're lying to yourself. How embarrassing."

Gendry's jaw set mulishly and he muttered a curse before walking away from the yard and his mount. He wasn't angry.

He returned to his rooms in haste and flung the door shut. Exhaustion from the day washed over him then, and the last thing he remembered was lying down on the bed and telling himself he was just going to close his eyes for a second.

He had been dreaming of his squire's dead eyes when he woke to his blade at someone's throat, the person beneath him whimpering. Eyes flung wide, he ripped his hand and blade away from the crying maidservant. Seven, she was so young.

Once he let go, she fled from the room. Gendry stood alone in her wake, still trying to piece together how he almost killed an innocent without even knowing. There was the sound of a clearing throat, and Gendry looked up to find an older castle servant standing in the doorway, an expression of utter disapproval on her face.

"You likely have given the poor girl nightmares."

Gendry groaned, "From the bottom of my heart I am sorry. It's never happened before...I didn't know...I was still –,"

"Oh, stop your blithering, boy. You think I don't know what the battles do to fightin' folk? My husband still wakes, screamin' that the dead are at our door. I told that fool girl not to wake you like that, but she had to go and do it anyways. Least now she'll know for the future."

Gendry jerked his head back, and frowned. Why in the Seven where all the servants in the North so bloody rude?

"Why did she wake me?" he asked.

The old woman looked at him witheringly, "You're none too bright, are you?"

Gendry scowled, "If you could just tell me without insulting me, that would be great."

Rather than replying, the servant pointed to the open window, which showed the last rays of a blood-orange sunset.

"_Shit_." The feast.

The woman harrumphed behind him, and he resisted the urge to scowl at her again.

"The Queen's chamberlain sent over clothes that you are to wear," she said, "Seein' as you have none suitable of your own. She said to say that you should be grateful her Grace didn't send you to the Great Hall as naked as the day you were born. There is a bath already drawn for you in the adjoinin' rooms. I'll send another maid to aid you seein' as you went and scared the last away. Within the half hour we'll send a guard to escort you to the Great Hall with plenty o' time before the feast begins."

She left as Gendry called his thanks to her. Maybe she wasn't so rude after all.

He changed his mind after he realised she had drawn him a cold bath. He wondered where and how the North had created the apparent hordes of mean old servants.

The feast started off well enough, Gendry would think in hindsight.

The Great Hall was lit at every hearth, and Gendry basked in its drowsy warmth. It was nice after the cold bath. The High Table had been placed on the dais, and the rows of long tables placed throughout the rest of the hall like he remembered from the feast after the Long Night.

Small nobles, guards, and soldiers from the arriving party, Winterfell, and the nearby Castle Cerwyn all lined the lower hall, each individual voice raising the noise in the room to a deafening din.

Gendry was rather surprised when, instead of being lead to the lower hall with the lesser nobles, he was led to the dais. He was still from the high nobility, a brother to the current Lady Paramount, and a friend to the Six Kingdom's Small Council to be sure, but after all, he was a Southron noble and technically considered a foreign, unlanded knight by the present company. By rights he should have considered himself blessed to even be seated close to the High Table, let alone across from the North's princess and next to its Crown Prince.

He knew Sansa would be offending more than a few lords and ladies here tonight by doing so. Evidently she knew that too, as when she finally entered the Great Hall and approached the dais, she addressed him third after her sister and her son, and embraced him like he were family. It would have at least quietened the grumbles somewhat, as having the favour of royalty often allowed even the lowest on that ridiculous highborn hierarchy to bypass convention.

It was less than an hour of conversation and Gendry was still marvelling in Sansa's skill at manipulating her subjects, when he got a face full of peas thrown at him by her son.

Gendry considered the boy. "I don't like you very much," he told Rickard in a conversational tone.

Rickard stuck his tongue out.

"Bertha?" Sansa called out, and the nursemaid came to her side diligently. "Can you please put my son to bed? He seems tired."

"Mother!" The boy groaned.

Sansa sighed, and beckoned her son forward. He leapt to her side, and received a kiss on the forehead for his efforts. The boy obviously thought he was going to be let off, so his little shoulder drooped when Sansa whispered, "Goodnight, my love. Sleep well."

After the rest of the table wished him goodnight, with Arya planting a kiss on his cheek, he walked back to the nursemaid, and sulked. It was then he reminded Gendry shockingly of someone familiar, although for the life of him Gendry couldn't figure out whom.

After the boy left, conversation continued much the same. Lord Cerwyn filled the boy's seat without asking the Queen, which earned him an annoyed look from Arya, who now had to talk to him.

After a glass or two of ale, Gendry finally found himself relaxing, and gods forbid, actually enjoying the night. He found himself wheezing at some of the sly comments Lord Cerwyn had made, and was surprised to find out that he had originally been a hunter who had caught the eye of Lady Jonelle Cerwyn, who had been at that point the only surviving member of House Cerwyn.

"Not what you expected, aye?" Lord Cerwyn asked with a glint in his eye.

Gendry grinned, "No. But it's a relief to know someone else who wasn't raised as a highborn."

Cerwyn nodded with a laugh, "Although the highborns in the North have done a damned good job at getting the sticks out of their arses, I must say."

"What was that, Cerwyn?" Jorelle Mormont called from across the table, "Sticks in our arses, is it? Just you wait then – I'll take that stick out and whack you with it!"

The table laughed uproariously, Gendry along with them, now more than slightly drunk.

"Aye," Cerwyn hooted, "Then thank the gods you're leaving tomorrow!"

"Well you can thank our princess for that. She wanted to get an early start on the road back to Deepwood!"

Gendry's smile dropped, and gradually he felt every beat of his labouring heart echoing through his chest.

"You're leaving tomorrow?" He managed to ask Arya mildly.

Arya had frozen, staring back at Gendry without so much as a blink. He could feel Sansa's eyes on him, too. Cerwyn was eyeing him with a frown, but the rest of the table hadn't noticed the change.

The Mormont woman continued, thinking Gendry had asked the question of her, "Hmm, well yes. We can scarcely afford to deprive more soldiers from the western coast, especially –," Jorelle halted mid-sentence when one of the other ladies hissed at her. With a guilty look at her Queen, she clumsily corrected herself, "I-I mean to say, our navy needs the full leadership to properly support the contingent of our forces still occupied in the South."

To whatever tactical information Jorelle Mormont had just let slip, Gendry paid not the slightest amount of attention.

His eyes left Arya's and refused to look back, "Yes, well that sounds fair."

He looked at the Queen and asked, "Your Grace, please excuse me. I suddenly find myself exhausted."

"Gendry." He heard Arya murmur, but he ignored it.

Sansa looked impassively between Gendry and Arya, and replied, "By all means, rest."

Cerwyn moved aside to let Gendry pull his chair out, giving Gendry's arm an awkward pat as his did so. Gendry stood and bowed to the Queen, before fleeing the room.

Gendry nodded, and fled to his rooms as fast as his feet could take him, anger growing with every seething step. It didn't surprise him in the slightest that barely a moment after he had stepped through the door, he felt the brush of Arya's shadow behind him.

"I never promised you anything, Gendry. You knew that even in the Banefort."

He wished to the gods that she had just left him for a few moments more to collect himself. But as it was, her presence was like a hot poker to already-burned skin.

"No," he growled, "You never promised me anything. Still I came here, like a fucking fool. You could have at least told me you were leaving."

Two days. He had only been in Winterfell for two days, and already he had been crushed once again under Arya Stark's fucking boot.

"What did you expect to gain, then? Did you forget that I'm not a lady to be married off and bred like a horse? I thought we had resolved that the last time you were in Winterfell."

Gendry recoiled, and replied with his voice rising to a shout, "Did I fucking _say_ I wanted you to marry me? Did –," he cut himself off with a sharp intake of breath. Then, with every last drop of will in himself he reined his explosive anger into submission. He swore once he would never be the man they told him Robert Baratheon was, and he would keep that oath to his dying breath.

After a moment, he answered quietly from a raw place within himself, "I never expected you to be a lady. Ever. Even when I made that stupid fucking proposal after the Long Night. I only ever wanted a family. I only ever wanted you to love me as I have loved you."

"Love?" She scoffed. "If you loved me so much, why was it that the first time I saw you after the Great Council was by a coincidence? Not _one_ word for almost ten years. If you loved me so much even when we were children, then why did you abandon me for the Brotherhood? Tell the truth, you only ever wanted an escape from a life that made you miserable and I was the most convenient option."

Gendry took a deep breath in, and let it out slowly. "You know, I keep expecting the Arya I knew when I was a boy to come back. The one who I trusted with my life, the one that would always have my guard, who would try and fight anyone who threatened me, even though you were half as tall as I was and annoying as all the Seven hells combined. That girl was fierce and kind and always protected those weaker than her."

Arya looked away, "That girl is long dead."

Gendry laughed. It was a wretched, bitter thing. "I think I am finally beginning to realise that. Tell me, did you ever actually care for me at all, or did you just want an easy fuck?"

Arya flinched, but her mouth remained closed.

Gendry nodded, sighing, anger fizzling out slowly into sorrow and grief. He had worshipped the idea of her for so long, yearning for that completeness she could bring him. But she couldn't, because he doubted if she even had it herself. He had loved someone who only existed in a mixture of memories and fantasies.

"Arya, I think I would like you to leave."

She looked at him for a long time. Finally, without a word, she left.

* * *

A/N: While one of my favourite chapters to write, it has probably been the hardest, seeing as I've always known it was coming but didn't know how to express it in a way that was true to the characters and their story arcs.

Also, you may have noticed that there is another implied ship in this fic. You can choose to ignore it if you like, but its been fun laying hints everywhere.

P.S The Night King ain't got shit on those old mean ladies of Winterfell.


	7. The Road From Winterfell

Chapter 7

He watched them leave from the battlements, until they looked like nothing more than a stream of ants snaking around the road west.

Their stay had been so short, but then, the party of fifty-odd lords, ladies, and soldiers had completed their true purpose – to act as a formal escort to the Princess of the North as she made her way back to retake command of the of the Northern Fleet.

He hadn't gone down to breakfast with them, nor had he been amongst those in the main courtyard wishing them farewell. It was only after they had left that he had made his way up to the walls to watch, the stamping of heavy feet audible even from his position.

Arya had turned around once to look at him, although her features were almost unrecognisable from the distance. He had remained blank, and in the end it was she that turned away.

He had little idea of what he felt. The moment felt too large to comprehend, the end to a story that had occupied a part of him since he was a youth of sixteen and he had decided to haul himself out of his own misery to defend a scrawny little gutter rat doomed to the Night's Watch.

He had just lost his oldest friend, the first person to ever offer him a family, and the person that could hurt him the most. He then identified the emotion. He was in mourning.

Gendry felt someone stand next to him.

"You know," Sansa said, "She isn't the same girl as when you were young.

Gendry gave the Queen a pointed stare. He doubted he and Sansa had ever known the same Arya. He wished she would just go away so he could get angry, mope, and maybe get drunk in peace. Not necessarily in that order.

Sansa gave a wry glance, "Don't give me that look. I could have you strung up by your toes in a half hour if I so wanted."

"I suppose you could."

There was a pause, and finally Sansa sighed, "She also isn't the same person who rejected you all those years ago. She is much more open, and much more passionate. More like the girl I remember from _my_ childhood."

"Could have fooled me," Gendry muttered with spite.

Sansa looked at him sharply, "And you are not that same lovesick boy, no matter how much you seem to be trying to act like him."

So Arya had told her sister about him...and he had thought the humiliation couldn't possibly get worse. He glared at Sansa and said through gritted teeth, "I mean no offense, your Grace, but I suddenly have somewhere I must be."

One delicately raised eyebrow let him know how believable his lie was. "Well," she said eventually, "Don't go too far. I'm sure we could find something for you to do in Winterfell." Then she smiled, jarring Gendry in its unexpectedness, "I know Rickard would be happy if you did stay. He talks very highly of you – seems to think you are a pirate for some reason."

He snorted. The statement seemed innocent and charming enough, but Gendry had heard Tyrion speak often enough of Sansa, had seen enough of her policies and decisions and their repercussions for the Six Kingdoms to know better. The light in her eyes shone a little too brightly, the smile on her face a little too sly.

She had a plan for him, and he wasn't sure if he wanted to stick around to find out.

But Gendry couldn't afford to act rashly. He decided to hedge his bets. After all, she hadn't given him an outright command to remain in Winterfell, and even then, he had never pledged his allegiance to her as his Queen. "I will take your suggestion into consideration, your Grace. But really, I must go. I have someone I must see."

Sansa cocked her head to the side, glacial blue eyes assessing him, "Fine. But you will be having supper with us tonight in my solar. _That_ is a command. Do not make me send my chamberlain, because I will."

He puffed, "I wouldn't dare try to get further on the bad side of her, nor any of the servants here. Never have I offended a group of people so thoroughly and so quickly."

A smirk graced the Northern Queen's lips, "Yes. They are favourites of mine."

He had no doubt.

* * *

Gendry was grateful to be away from Sansa, but was left with the conundrum of where to go next. He couldn't very well get ragingly drunk now he was expected to meet the Northern Queen and her heir for supper, but he couldn't bare the idea of facing his own thoughts sober for the rest of the day.

The solution presented itself quickly, and so Gendry picked up what was left of his dignity off the stone beneath him and made his way down to the forges.

His reception was an entirely different creature to what he had received last time. He had stood at the entrance for all of a few moments before a smith had noticed him.

This time, he was ignored. Instead the smith had leaned over to nudge his partner, and both had stared at Gendry in an expression he couldn't quite understand. Others had noticed them staring, and soon more were looking at him, some twenty odd castle smiths and their apprentices. One small, serious man broke ranks to approach him, when a hard Northern voice bellowed out from across the clearing of the forge.

"Oi! I didn't realise you lot were being paid to chat like a bunch of bloody fishwives! Last I saw, those new iron swords the master-at-arms was expecting still ain't fucking done. Get back to work!"

Gendry grinned, and turned to greet Davyn. Once upon a time, he had been the first of the Northern smiths to adopt Gendry's technique of forging dragonglass, and to accept Gendry himself amongst the Northern soldiers and smiths. A good twenty years older than Gendry's four and thirty, he was bald but for a leathery face hedged in by a bushy, black beard, although the years seemed to have greyed it.

Now the bear of a man was grinning like a lunatic at him, and soon enfolded Gendry in a crushing hug while grumbling, "I heard there was a fancy Southron priss lurking around Winterfell. Never thought it'd be you though, lad."

Gendry shook his head and let go of the man, "I'm gone for only a moment, and you go and make yourself respectable. Head castle blacksmith, my arse."

They burst out laughing together, and it was then that Gendry felt guilty. This man had once been one of Gendry's closest companions, if only because of the months spent slaving over a blistering forge, driven by the shadow of the Others at their backs. It would make any two people close friends.

He clenched his jaw, "I'm sorry I didn't send word before –,"

Davyn cut him off with a raised hand and a shake of his head, and with a kind eye said, "Think nothing more of it, old friend. Gods know we've all had more than enough on our plates to worry about shit like this. I'm just glad to have you at Winterfell, here and now."

Gendry let out a breath he hadn't known he was holding. He hadn't realised how much he had been relying on Winterfell's forges being a haven for him. He looked at him friend, "Would it be too much trouble if I worked here for a while?"

Davyn narrowed his eyes at him, "Only if you keep up that pissing fancy talk. Speak proper."

Gendry laughed, and dropped the highborn veneer he now kept unconsciously, "Give me something to work on, then."

Davyn nodded approvingly, "Talbot's bench over there is free while he's away on business. You can have it, though I'm warning you, it's going to be nails, sail rings, and arrow tips for you. There are bars of wrought iron to the side to use. Talbot's apprentice is away with him, so I'm afraid you'll get no help with the bellows."

"That's fine, Davyn," Gendry smiled, "Actually it's perfect." The monotony of heating the forge himself, and of working on small items instead of the delicate reforging and folding it took to create castle steel, for instance, would give Gendry space to think.

With that, Davyn had asked no other questions, but had simply led Gendry to the empty work space. "I'll leave you to it, then," Davyn grunted, clapping Gendry on the back, and he left. Gendry looked around, ignoring the curious glances of his neighbours. Amongst the belling of hammers on anvils, the hissing rush as steam escaped the slack tubs, and the throbbing heat of the forges, Gendry felt himself relax for the first time since he left Storm's End.

After cleaning his space of soot and dust, arranging his tools, and filling his slack tub full of fresh, icy water, Gendry got to work and the idea of time faded away.

While his hands acted in perfect motion, his mind was clouded on his next step. Gendry had no proper place in Winterfell, no real reason for staying. Not anymore. He would have to leave. But where could he go?

The prospect of starting over again after so long terrified him.

His first thought was to return to Storm's End, back to comfort and safety and home, but he quickly abandoned the idea. For one, Gendry's pride couldn't take much more mortification. Secondly, even he was smart enough to know that his presence would divide loyalties between the Stormlanders. It would be a death sentence for any newfound legitimacy Mya had gained as Lady Paramount. He wouldn't do that to her. Nor could he return to King's Landing for the same reasons.

It was then that it truly hit him then how selfish he had been. He had abandoned every single one of his responsibilities for a life he had dreamed and believed he could lead in the North. He had thrown his only surviving sibling to the court life he had so despised himself, and to the whims of its courtiers. Mya had tried to tell him so many times what would happen. And Gendry had ignored her. He suddenly felt sick to his core, wishing nothing more than to take it all back.

But he couldn't, and he would never be able to return to that life to fix what he had done.

Instead Gendry would have to make something of his present, and of his future. To make it all worth it. He took a breath, focusing himself back on the work and back on his planning.

He supposed he could go elsewhere in the Six Kingdoms – he could start out again amongst the commonfolk as a village smith with a different name and a different story. But after a moment, he realised that the thought didn't appeal to him as it once would have. Sansa was right, he was no longer the boy from the Long Night, and certainly not the boy from Flea Bottom.

So, he would stay in the North.

That thought plagued him until the fog suddenly lifted, and Gendry came back to the present. He saw the sky darkening above him, now a dull pink hue misted with clouds, and he realised he hadn't even noticed the passing of the afternoon.

He looked around blearily, and found the forge was empty except for Davyn, who seemed to be filling paperwork in the corner. Davyn grinned broadly when he saw Gendry looking at him, "Ho! The legendary smith awakens! If I hadn't known you before, lad, I would've thought you were ignoring us the half-dozen times conversation was struck."

Gendry pulled a contrite face. He hadn't even realised anyone had talked to him at all.

Davyn waved his hand, "Don't worry, I told the others you were like this. They weren't cross – if anything it probably added to your stature. They'll go home and tell their families that they smithed with the great Lord Gendry Baratheon himself. They'll exaggerate it, of course, but there's nothing to be done about that. And I'll never hear the end of it from those bloody apprentices. Soft in the head, the lot of them. You'll have ruined them forever for me."

"I wouldn't think that a bunch of Northerners would be so proud to smith with a Southron lord. Not even a lord, actually. Just a noble," Gendry said and smiled quizzically.

Davyn scrunched his face up, "What do you mean_, proud to smith with a Southron lord_?" The inflection on his last words sounded like he was asking about some deadly infliction Gendry had just caught.

Gendry's brows knitted together, "What else could you mean, then?"

"I mean that they're proud to smith with Gendry fucking Baratheon, master blacksmith of the Long Night. They worship the ground you walk on, boy," Davyn spluttered.

Gendry gave a derisive snort, "Don't mock me. There were many blacksmiths in the Army of the Living. We all did our part. Hells, you were there too, and I didn't see them worshipping at _your_ feet." The whole idea was almost too ridiculous to even comment on.

Davyn quietened, looking over Gendry as if seeing him with new eyes. After a moment, he shook his head slowly, and gave a small smile, "Not likely."

There was a slight, awkward pause before Davyn spoke again. "Have you gotten it all out of your system, then?"

Chagrined, Gendry sighed, "I think so."

"And?"

"I'm staying in the North, but I couldn't decide where to go or what to do. Took me a while to realise," Gendry said, gesturing all around them, "That I could never be anything other than what I am. A blacksmith."

Davyn slapped him on the back, grinning, "There you go. Got there eventually." Then he sobered, "I wish I could offer you a place at Winterfell, old friend, but we're already over capacity at the moment. There would simply be no room."

"I don't think I could stay in Winterfell in any case," Gendry said truthfully, "Not after everything. But I would be grateful if you could tell me of any anyplace that needs a blacksmith."

He would try not to be too disappointed if he ended up at some backwater village. A small, traitorous voice whispered to him that he might as well go back to the Six Kingdoms if that was the case.

Davyn scratched his head, and raised his brows, "Believe it or not, I have a cousin in White Harbour smithing at the New Castle forge for the old, fat lord himself. I had a raven a month or two back asking after blacksmiths, saying they were desperate and whatnot. No bloody wonder, considering..." Davyn trailed off, with a tight glance at Gendry. "In any case, it might just do the trick."

"A good forge and honest work is all I need."

Davyn nodded, "That you do. I'll send a raven, and write something up as well for you to give to Robard when you arrive."

"Thank you, Davyn."Gendry chewed his lip, "Could it be done by tomorrow morn? I have my reasons for wanting to be clear of Winterfelll as quickly as possible."

"Oh aye, certainly," Davyn snickered, "I'd wager the whole of Westeros will soon know your reasons. The town hasn't had such good gossip in the longest of whiles. Nothing the world likes better than a good lovers' quarrel between highborns. Quality material for mummers and minstrels, that."

Gendry grimaced, and ignored the unlikeable comment from an otherwise likable man.

He hoped with all his heart that he would be remembered as more than just another jilted lover of another Stark woman. Although, if he was to grace the annals of history at all, he supposed it might as well be for that. Gendry thanked Davyn again, and then returned to his rooms as quickly as possible.

Maybe if he moved fast enough, he could even avoid the castle servants.

* * *

The Queen in the North's chambers were situated at the very top of the Great Keep, which Gendry soon learned was much bigger inside than it looked on the out. By the time Gendry had followed the one of the Queensguard up from Gendry's own rooms on the guest floors, a journey consisting of a rabbit warren's worth of staircases and halls, he was red in the face and huffing quietly.

How quiet he had been was debatable, though, because the Queensguard sent an irritated look back at him.

Gendry really needed to get back to the training yard.

The entry to Sansa's solar was a door cast in simple oak and iron, not at all what he would expect for the private rooms of royalty and the heart of Winterfell's court. Gendry preferred it immensely over the gaudiness of the Red Keep.

At the door there were another two Queensguard, a thin-lipped man and beady-eyed woman, both standing in full armour emblazoned with the Stark sigil and holding wickedly-sharpened spears. They let Gendry and his grumpy guide through with intense stares and no words. The door opened to a large room thoroughly carpeted in rich rugs and furs, a crackling fireplace in the corner, and a heavy wooden table in the centre of the room currently holding two nobles and one queen at its head.

"Ah, look who decided to finally grace us with his presence!" A voice cried out, and Gendry realised with a pleasant surprise that it was Lord Cerwyn, lounging back against his chair at the table with a lazy grin.

When Sansa had told him come to supper, he had assumed it would just be himself, Rickard, and the Queen. He had resigned himself to another evening of weaponised peas. Yet the boy was nowhere in sight, and Lord and Lady Cerwyn seemed comfortable taking the two seats to the left of Sansa.

"My Queen," the man beside him said, "I have brought up Ser Gendry as requested."

"Thank you, Brandon. You may stand watch in the corner for the duration of the meal."

The Queensguard gave a short bow, and took his place by the wall facing the window.

It was then at Sansa finally stood, Lady Cerwyn and her husband following to do the same. Gendry bowed to Sansa, and inclined his head towards the other two. "Thank you for the invitation, your Grace. And it is a pleasure to see you again, Lord and Lady Cerwyn."

The pair responded in kind, with their thick Northern brogues.

"Please, sit," Sansa said, holding a hand out to the chair on her right. Gendry took the seat in silence, and they all sat down.

After a moment, Sansa commented drily, "I'm overjoyed to have not needed to send Mariah."

"Mariah...as in your chamberlain Mariah?" Lady Jonnelle asked, puzzled.

Sansa smiled, "Yes."

"And where is Rickard tonight?" Gendry asked, clearing his throat and changing the subject.

"He is currently in the nursery, playing with the Cerwyn children."

Lord Cerwyn smirked, "I'm sure poor Bertha will have her hands full." The table laughed.

The night went on like that throughout the meal, small talk and large amounts of food, consisting of succulent, dripping meats and perfectly roasted vegetables. At one point throughout the night Gendry poked at one or two strange-looking foods, and later nearly choked on something burning in his mouth.

The group laughed. "You get used to it. I enjoy it now, in fact," Lord Cerwyn said, "Trade with Northoss has indeed brought over some interesting things."

Gendry gulped some wine down, and spluttered, "Well I would enjoy it if those interesting things could stay away from my mouth."

The night went on pleasantly after that, although Gendry started to get a feeling in his gut as time progressed. Eventually he was proven right, as it all came to a head when Lady Jonelle asked politely, "What will you do in the North now you are here, Ser Gendry?"

"I would like to seek work as a blacksmith in White Harbour," Gendry replied, "The head castle blacksmith here is an old friend, and has written a recommendation for me."

Lord and Lady Cerwyn both stiffened, shooting glances at Sansa and leaving Gendry greatly confused.

She looked back at them in exasperation, "There is no need for dramatics, honestly. I never said it had to be a secret, nor given its size would I have ever been able to keep it secret. I merely said that I would prefer it to be kept quiet for the time being."

Gendry frowned, "Am I missing something?"

"Many things, in fact," Sansa retorted, "But this one concerns our expansion of the White Harbour fleet. As White Harbour is famous for its gold- and silversmiths, we are currently resolving the issue of their shortage of blacksmiths."

The White Harbour _what_? Gendry's jaw ticked as he realised the ships he had seen had on his journey here were not just a few, but likely numbered in the hundreds. His eyes narrowed, "And reason for the urgency and secrecy of this process?"

Sansa smiled a smile that gave absolutely nothing away, "We have reason to believe pirates from the Free Cities might try the Eastern coast. We would prefer to be prepared."

Gendry was unconvinced. Something was niggling at the back of his mind, and it took him a moment to identify. "Free Cities? As in plural?" Gendry asked slowly, "Or _a_ Free City, as in Braavos – or more specifically, it's Iron Bank?"

Sansa's face was impassive, but the visceral reactions of the others confirmed it. Out of the corner of his eye, Gendry saw the Queensguard put his hand on his hilt, and Lady Cerwyn went so far as to hiss at Gendry, "To whom have you been speaking?!"

Gendry glared back, "It's almost as if you forget I was Master of War on the Small Council for years. I was _there_ the last time this happened in 311, and I was _there_ when they signed the treaty a year later."

Lady Cerwyn drew back suddenly, and after a moment, gave a pained look at Sansa, "My Queen, I apologise for the outburst."

Sansa smiled wryly, "It would not be a Northern meal without at least one of them."

"So it is true then," Gendry interrupted, gut clenching, "The Iron Bank intends to re-start the conflict."

The married pair fell silent, watching. Sansa sighed, tapping her fingers on the table, "We believe so, although it is uncertain how they will try this time. We do know, however, that Asha Greyjoy was in contact with them as little as year ago. After all, the Iron Bank will have its due, and the dues owed from the former Seven Kingdoms are quite large – to put it lightly. "

Gendry grimaced. So the ironborn were a distraction after all, intended to drain resources and divide attention. He was beginning to get a headache. "Does your brother know?"

Sansa snorted, the most unladylike thing he had ever seen her do, and said resentfully, "You do remember who you are talking about, yes? There's little that my brother doesn't know, although whether he shares the information or not is another thing entirely."

Gendry winced, feeling stupid. Of course Brandon would know. "What else can we do?" Gendry asked.

"We?" Sansa raised both brows, "There is no 'we'. You have just said you intend to spend the rest of your life as a blacksmith in White Harbour. You have my permission to do that, after you swear allegiance as my loyal subject. It _is_ what you wanted, after all, is it not?"

Gendry felt as if he had been slapped down. As much as he wanted to argue, he knew she was right. He was not the Master of War, not the Lord of Storm's End, nor a lord at all. He had no right to make demands of a queen – the most he could contribute now was to serve the North's forges, and serve them well.

He clenched his jaw, "Then, with your permission I will do just that, your Grace."

Sansa stared at him coldly, before turning to the still-silent Lord and Lady Cerwyn, "Jonelle, Bennard, I apologise but I would ask you to give us a few moments of privacy."

Lady Cerwyn leaned over to kiss Sansa's cheek, the informality of it a little shocking to Gendry. "We should take leave now in any event," Lady Jonelle said with a twinkle in her eye, "This child in my belly is a bigger terror than any of her brothers or sisters were."

As soon as the words came out of her mouth, her husband leapt up hastily, assisting her with her chair. Sansa took the woman's hand and smiled, "Rest well. I'll send for you in the morning."

Gendry looked at Lord and Lady Cerwyn a little wistfully as they said their farewells and left. Soon it was just Gendry and the Queen, and her guard in the corner.

"Well?" Gendry said, somewhat rude. He heard the Queensguard growl in the corner.

But Sansa ignored Gendry and rose from the table, and wandered over to various knickknacks on a mantle to the side. Gendry refused to rise with her – another blatant and disrespectful breach in etiquette. The Queensguard had his hand back on his hilt, his face nigh apoplectic. Idly, Gendry wondered how far he could push the man before he exploded.

"You know," Sansa said, drawing Gendry's attention back to her, "When I first heard that you had been made a member of the Small Council, I had thought it would end in disaster."

Gendry took a sip of his wine, "You and everyone else in Westeros."

"The problem is that you're too impulsive," Sansa told him, "Most times you act before thinking, and you let your emotions get in the way of everything. It also doesn't help that you possess little talent for politics, or the fortitude for court games."

"Thank you," Gendry deadpanned.

The Queen glanced at him irritably, and Gendry put his hands up half-heartedly in surrender.

Sansa picked up something from the mantle that looked like a locket, turning it over in her hands in distraction. "You surprised everyone though, even Tyrion. Over the years, your decisions became well-measured and sturdy, if not necessarily brilliant, and you were always ready to listen to those more learned than you. A mark of any good leader, and of any great lord," She paused, turning back to him, "And in warfare, your natural instinct for strategy and tactics is almost unparalleled. I watched in awe seven years ago as you broke those rebelling houses and solidified the Stormlands under your rule, truth be told. The whole of Westeros did."

Gendry startled at the sudden praise. He had not thought of his first few blood-soaked years as Lord Paramount in a long time, or the fact that he had technically been made Master of War before he had been unanimously accepted as Lord Paramount. Actually, he _actively_ tried not to think about it, if he wanted to keep his conscience clear. Either way, Sansa was being unnecessarily open, and it made Gendry suspicious, "Why are you telling me this?"

She shrugged, her curtain of auburn hair falling over her shoulder as she did so. "I had wondered where that man was, when you first arrived here. I think I saw a flash or two of him today."

He blinked, "Yes, well, you won't see any in future. I'll be gone for good by tomorrow."

But all she did was smile, and reply, "Maybe, maybe not."

With that, she dismissed him.

* * *

It felt like the night passed in the blink of an eye, as come the morning he was summoned to the godswood before the heart tree, and he swore to serve the Queen in the North obediently, loyally and faithfully as her subject, with Lord and Lady Cerwyn standing by as witnesses.

Soon after he said his farewells, he took his weapons and his pack and went to the stables to collect his horse.

On the fifth day since he had arrived in Winterfell, he left without a backwards glance.

* * *

A/N: Just a note on the Cerwyns. While this fic is based off the ending the tv series left, many of the characters and subplots come straight from the book, e.g. Asha/Yara. In the tv series, Cley Cerwyn is still alive and kickin', while in the books he died at the Battle of Winterfell (or rather, _a_ battle of Winterfell), and his sister, Jorelle, is the last remaining heir of House Cerwyn. Voila.

Where I got the idea that I'd be able to finish this thing in ten chapters, I have no clue. Currently expanded by two more chapters, we'll see how we go.

Once again, thank you for being wonderful readers.


	8. White Harbour

He arrived at White Harbour in the shining sun, the crisp morning air freezing his nose and his ears, and looked at the city with new eyes.

Wide cargo vessels choked the river, ones he had merely glanced over when travelling to Winterfell. Now he realised they were full to the brim with vast wooden barrels and lumpy piles covered strapped down with rope and waxed cloth.

In hindsight, the obviousness of it all was overwhelming.

Soon he came to the outer docks of White Harbour, and snorted quietly at his situation. It had been a matter of almost two weeks since he had been here last, and the very reek of rotting fish and the piercing caw of the gulls themselves were taunting him.

Once docked, moving through the crowds was an effort of constraint, as his palfrey trailing beside him seemed more than happy to break feet if her neighbours were not moving quickly enough for her liking. If nothing else, it was a buffer that gave Gendry a relatively easy walk, allowing him to take in the wide streets cobbled with pale grey stone and the whitewashed houses with their slated roofs. The effect was near blinding. Never had he seen a city so clean, and it made him feel out of place. He missed the filth of King's Landing.

And there upon the crest of the hill sat its crown. As he came to the overbearing height of New Castle, it reminded him vaguely of Highgarden. Gendry joined the stream of people entering the outer walls of the castle, unhindered by the guards.

He grinned. It was bloody lucky that no matter when or where castles were built, as a general rule their forges always seemed to be in the same place. He caught a strong gust of wind as he walked in, sparking a coughing fit as the polluted, sooty air curled in his lungs.

Of course it was then that a smith came to him, as Gendry was bent in half, eyes watering.

"Can I help you? A cup of water, mayhaps?"

With a last, barking cough, Gendry stood straight, defying that tickle in the back of his throat with everything he had. "No," Gendry choked, "I'm fine."

The smith looked unconcerned, "Back to my first question, then. Can I help you?"

Gendry hesitated. "Err, would you happen to know where I could find a...Robard?"Gendry asked, brandishing Davyn's letter, which had been tucked safely under his leather jerkin. "I'm a blacksmith. Robard's cousin sent me from Winterfell with a letter. I'm seeking to work here."

Instantly the man's demeanour changed, becoming more open and good-natured. Gendry wouldn't be at fault for thinking the man in front of him was a new person entirely.

"Aye, a blacksmith is it? We're desperate for more of those. Let me show you to him."

The man deposited Gendry in front of another middle-aged man, bent over the desk with paperwork. With a few whispered words, the first smith left him to Robard.

It was soon apparent that if Gendry had to pick an opposite of Davyn, than his cousin Robard was it. Sure, their build was similar – you would never find a weak or lanky blacksmith, at least not one worth his salt – but their mannerisms were completely different.

For instance, when Gendry had introduced himself, Robard eyes had widened and he had shaken Gendry's hand overenthusiastically. It left Gendry unnerved.

Still the man seemed excitable and fidgety, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

"Please! Have a look around for a bit while I sort out a previous matter. I'll be right back and we can discuss your work here." Robard prattled, and wandered off to talk to another of his men.

Gendry frowned after him, and wondered how such an odd and panicky man became head of a castle smithy. He shrugged, and left the man to his business. He was no-one to judge

The area was smaller than the one at Winterfell. Then again, most castle forges would be smaller than the one at Winterfell, which he'd been told had been built to forge the ambitions of the Kings of Winter at a time when they were ruthless and savage warmongers. They would have loved their descendants.

The space itself certainly felt more cluttered, with dozens of those immense barrels crowding the clearing. Curious, Gendry approached them to see what was inside.

Gendry groaned. Nails and arrow tips. Hundreds and thousands of them. All ready to be sent down to the harbour or to the fletchers, no doubt. More evidence he had missed.

"Lord Gendry?"

Seven above, that man's voice was grating. Gendry gave a shallow smile, "It's just Gendry, or Ser Gendry if you insist."

Robard blinked, "My lord –" Gendry sighed heavily, but the man continued, "I wanted to apologise."

Apologise? "Apologise for what?" He demanded, bewildered.

Wringing his hands, Robard continued as if he hadn't heard Gendry, "I would have loved nothing more than to have worked alongside you. It would have the highest honour of my life, my lord. But orders are orders. I will give my prayers to the Smith for you."

Gendry's eyes widened.

But it was too late. His stomach filled with dread when he heard the tell-tale sound of iron-capped boots pounding on dirt floors. Gendry whipped around to find a squad of castle guards approaching him, shields bearing the merman's sigil.

Gendry snarled as he rounded back on Robard, seizing him by his collar, "_What have you done?!"_

Arms outstretched and eyes fanatic, the man pleaded, "It was my duty, my lord. You have to understand. Those of us who serve the Smith _know_ what you mean to him, _know_ what you did for him, and he has answered our deepest prayers. It was his Will that you should return to the North, to White Harbour, and to save us from this plight."

He was insane. Incredulous, Gendry dropped the man and drew back. Behind him, the sound of feet had come to a stop. He swallowed roughly, heart hammering, and turned.

A tall, imperious woman with a gold emblem on her helmet stepped forward, "Ser Gendry Baratheon?"

Moments stretched out as he raced through his options. The savage and animalistic side roared for him to take his warhammer to skulls like a scythe to wheat. Gendry's fingers curled involuntarily, and he wondered if he could reach either of his weapons before they skewered him on those buggering tridents.

Likely not. Gendry asked warily, "Yes?"

"Our Lord Manderly has been expecting you. He grows impatient. You would not do well to keep him waiting longer."

Gendry made a face. "There must be some mistake," he said to them, "I haven't broken any laws."

The greying woman, who Gendry realised was likely the captain of the castle guard, narrowed her eyes and said abruptly, "You may ask any questions once you have arrived. Until then, silence is preferred."

Faced with the group of guards, all wielding their tridents in utter ease, Gendry saw no other option. "Please," Gendry said through gritted teeth, "Lead the way."

As he walked out of the forge, he glanced back at Robard. The snivelling, crazy bastard was nowhere to be seen.

* * *

The inside of Lord Wyman Manderly's solar was, unsurprisingly, dressed in shades of white and green and blue. The window shutters where thrown open, to let the Northern summer breeze through. Maybe they believed the weather was balmy, Gendry thought with an annoyed shiver, barely restraining himself from folding his hands under his armpits.

"Lord Gendry!" Manderly boomed, "So glad to have you here finally!"

And there in the centre, like a bulbous toad crouched over particularly fine mud patch, was Lord Manderly. The man was ancient, and if Gendry had heard the rumours right, not a day under seventy. With his gaudy aquamarine, gold, and white clothing, the man looked ridiculous.

"I haven't broken any laws, Lord Manderly. In fact, I had permission from her Grace to seek work here," Gendry spat, "So why have I been arrested?"

Manderly reared back, his jowls wobbling hazardously and with incredulity, "Arrested? Why, you're not under arrest! I heard you were in the castle walls and I wanted you here as soon as possible." He looked at the captain forebodingly, "Moyra?"

"You said you wanted Gendry Baratheon brought to your solar immediately, my lord," the captain deadpanned, wrinkled face blank, "I did as ordered."

"Ah." Lord Manderly looked back and forth between them, before a jovial smile took to his face, "A misunderstanding, then. Nothing to worry about."

"A misunderstanding?" Gendry cried, before he could think better of it, "Your guards dragged me here with a blade to my back the whole way, without so much as an explanation. I thought I was about to be thrown in a cell!"

"Yes, a small misunderstanding."

Gendry's mouth tightened. "Fine. Then you won't mind if I continue on my way," he said, making quickly for the door. His first step hadn't even made landfall when he found himself, once more, at the end of multiple spears.

A shout of sheer frustration curdled in the back of his throat.

"No, no." Manderly said in a high-pitched and cheerful tone from behind Gendry, "You are already here. It would be rude of you to leave now."

"Well, gods forbid I should want to appear _rude_," Gendry sniped, but felt his anger subsiding to bone-tired confusion. Nothing about this day was turning out like he had imagined. Or wanted. Gendry sighed, "Why am I here, Manderly, instead of in a forge where I belong?"

"What do you mean the for –,"Manderly paused, and peered around Gendry, "On second thought. Moyra, you can take your people and leave. This conversation should be private."

"My lord!" the captain protested, "But he is –"

"Now, captain."

Her expression dropped. "All the same," she said, reproach in her eyes, "I will be posting two of my men at the door."

With a pointed look at Gendry, she motioned at her men, who snapped to attention. They filed after her as she walked out, heavy footfalls audible long after she had left the room.

Gendry considered his position. He was now alone in the room with the old lord, who if rumours had been correct, was so rotund he had to be carried between places on a litter. Gendry could perhaps barge past the two at the door and make a run for it. He sighed. Or, more likely, be run down by the numerous other guards that irritating captain had no doubt hidden about the castle halls like sweets in a kitchen's pantry.

But there was always the second option, Gendry thought, as he eyed the window doubtfully.

"You wouldn't get far. It's a long drop and a quick stop, let me assure you."

Gendry wrinkled his nose, his only two plans dashed. That left him with the third and worst option – to listen.

"You'll have to excuse my captain, Lord Gendry," Lord Manderly implored. "She is not an ill-tempered person, only protective. These are difficult times, and you are a Southroner, after all."

"I want my hammer back," Gendry grumbled, ignoring Manderly's excuses. He already knew he was a Southroner. More important was that he had been stripped of his beloved hammer yet again, and Gendry swore there was a dull ache on his back where it usually hung.

"In time. And it'll be better once you stop being unnecessarily dramatic, boy," Manderly offered.

Sheer stubbornness held Gendry's glare in place. He wasn't being dramatic. The North was _making_ him dramatic.

The old lord shrugged, "Suit yourself."

An awkward hush fell, highlighted by the light whistling sound of the wind against the shutters. Reluctant to be the first to speak, Gendry took the chair across from Manderly and sat uninvited, his heavy body thumping into a slouch.

They held eye contact, neither saying a word. And held. And held.

"Father give me strength," Gendry heard Manderly mutter under his breath, "Fine. I see no point to this petty charade, so let us stop now."

The point was to irritate Manderly. Childish, but so very satisfying. Gendry's mood lifted slightly...

"Anyhow, I don't know what you mean about this forge business, when you very well know why you are here. As acting Lord Commander of the Eastern Fleet, your first duty should have been to report to me. The fact that you did not is highly reprehensible, my lord."

... and dropped once again.

* * *

In hindsight, the clues were all there. She had more or less told him the night before he had left.

"She tricked me," Gendry gritted out, finally quiet after almost a half hour of raging. It had gotten to the point that several guards had burst through the door, and Gendry had what was possibly the closest brush with death since Lannisport at the end of Moyra's blade.

"I would have taken the position, if she had just asked me." Even as he said the words, he doubted them. Still, he had thought he was running away from her trap, when instead he was running to embrace it. The mere thought set him clenching his jaw tighter.

"You'll break a tooth if you don't relax, lad." Gendry glowered at him.

Manderly sighed, "I know, Baratheon, I know. But you have to understand. Our Queen loves the North, and she loves her people. She would sacrifice anything for us, and we would follow her over the edge of the world for it." He smiled ruefully, "But for how skilful she is the political arts, I don't believe she fully knows how to deal with the honest or the honourable. Not anymore, at least."

"Meaning what?" Gendry asked begrudgingly.

"'Tis a matter of trust. Truthfully, I doubt she really trusts any of us, or will she ever. Instead she would prefer to manoeuvre us all around the board like cyvasse pieces, and keep us at an arm's length." Lord Manderly gave a small shrug, "It is our own fault, in part. How many of us broke our oaths to House Stark? How many sat idle when she was sold to that godscursed filth, Bolton? How many refused the second of House Stark's calls, decided to flee south instead, when it came time for the Long Night?"

"It still doesn't make it right."

"No, it doesn't." His narrowed eyes fixated on Gendry, "Nevertheless, she my Queen, and now she is yours. You chose to swear to her. No one made that choice but em_you_/em. Your Queen has given you an order, and her decisions are final and they are the law, Lord Baratheon."

Gendry saw he would get no further sympathy from Manderly, and fell silent. He fought a battle within himself, balancing once more on a knife's edge between duty and desire. On one hand he had sworn by the Old Gods and the New to be Sansa's loyal subject. On the other hand, however, he had just spent the better part of an hour cursing her to the deepest of the seven hells in the most creative ways possible.

But before he could reach a decision, Manderly spoke up, "At least look at what you would be giving up first. Meet with the people you would be defending, who you would leave at the mercy of killers. See the fleet you would command, before you make your decision."

He was laying it on thick. It was pure manipulation, and they both knew it.

"Very well," Gendry acknowledged finally, "But make it quick."

"Good man," Manderly grinned.

* * *

It was not an easy thing to get to the longship. It was true what Gendry had heard – Manderly's girth was so impressive that the only way that man was getting near a boat was via a litter, above a dozen sweating litter-bearers.

But all of that had lain forgotten once they had entered the inlet on the opposite side of the harbour, the one Gendry had wondered about on his arrival. As they approached the shoreline, small splashes sounding as the ship's oars dipped into the seas, Gendry's mouth opened in wonder and awe.

"So this is to be my purpose here?"Gendry asked, his voice sounding oddly breathy to his ears.

Manderly glanced up at him from where his litter had been set down on the upper deck."'Tis only until my granddaughter's husband returns from Deepwood. Queen Sansa has told me she intends for him to command the White Harbour fleet eventually, but first he must learn. There is a nice symmetry to it. My Wynafryd is heir to the Manderly lands, it seems only fitting that her husband rule its waters, and you'll be free to play with all the soot-covered hammers and melted iron your heart desires after that."

Gods he hoped this other man was competent, then. Even the most seasoned naval commander would have trouble with this.

The shoreline and the hills pulsed like a kicked ant hill. Everywhere Gendry looked, colossal skeletons of ships were propped up as dozens, if not hundreds, of workers toiled away at their construction. In the distance, through the wooded hills, there hundreds of tents crowded together. And that was just of what he could see.

Still, nothing compared to the ships in the harbour themselves. He estimated the fleet already numbered something close to the size of the Redwyne war fleet. Yet rather than war galleys, the ships seemed to be a mixture of longships and another type; one taller and broader than any ship Gendry had ever laid eyes on. Frankly he had no idea how they were moving without capsizing.

"Impressive, is it not?"

"How?" Gendry whispered, words almost failing him, "How have you amassed this many ships with no one the wiser? The Small Council knew of perhaps fifty longships and galleys in White Harbour's defence fleet, but nothing on this scale."

"The hills hide much of our activities. The builders and their families are not allowed to leave the camp, nor are the soldiers and sailors. They were aware of the requirements and agreed. All are highly paid for their troubles and were selected for their loyalty to the Northern crown."

"How many soldiers do you need to proper man these things?"

"Ten thousand at the very least. Which was a problem for us. As a realm we could field thirty thousand, perhaps, when construction started five years ago. It is even less now after the plague hit two years ago. Ten thousand was an amount the North could not afford to place in a single area."

Gendry squinted at him, "But there are soldiers everywhere. Campsites litter the hills. I would hazard at least eight thousand, if not more. But you are telling me this is impossible?"

"No, I'm telling you we have ten thousand to man the ships, almost to the exact number." Manderly shifted amongst his cushions awkwardly, looking everywhere but at Gendry.

_To the exact_ _ – _

Gendry stiffened in utter horror. The answer was so obvious, so simple a solution for a realm that was rich but with little men to spare. "Please tell me you didn't hire ten thousand fucking sellswords to fight within your own borders. Are you _mad_?"

Manderly grimaced. "Fifteen thousand, actually. We felt it was a necessary risk."

Gendry looked back at the shore, dread growing. Ordinary men and women could generally be trusted to defend their lands, defend their families. But sellswords had nothing, no collateral tying them to the place in which they were fighting, but for a piece of paper and cold, hard gold. Sometimes even that was not enough.

"Are they all at sea then, at least, away from the people?" Gendry grunted.

Manderly sighed, a deep and weary sound, "No. At least seven thousand are in the fleet. Another six thousand scattered over the eastern coastlands, and two thousand sent to strengthen the central Northern holds in case Braavos breaks through."

"What kind of sellsword company can field that many men?" Gendry exclaimed. And how much was it costing the North? Surely even their treasury wasn't endless. Better yet, how in the Seven hells would the North be able to control them once their contract ended? It was for that reason everyone knew you didn't use sellswords to fight on your own bloody soil.

The whole thing reeked of disaster.

"It is not one company, but three – the Wolf Pack, the Stormbreakers, and the Company of the Rose."

The names were familiar to him, but he knew little of them. Gendry wasn't sure if that was better or worse. "And how are you and Sansa so sure that they won't decide to invade the North themselves after their little stint is done? That they won't invade the rest of Westeros from there? Or that the Iron Bank won't just simply double their price and have them turn on you?"

"We have to believe –"

"That is not enough!" Gendry snapped, "You Northerners, of all people, know better than to trust blindly. I for one will not serve with men I cannot trust, my oaths be damned. There is a difference between serving with honour and serving with _blind stupidity_."

There was a long pause. "If you had let me finish my sentence," Manderly rebuked, "You would already have had your answer. We trust them because every captain in those companies has sworn oaths to our Queen before a heart tree."

Gendry quietened. He supposed the situation was unusual, but certainly not unheard of. Still he snorted, "If everyone kept their oaths, Manderly, Westeros would be a very different place. An oath does not make them trustworthy. I cannot believe that Sansa would agree to something like this."

"You aren't wrong. The Stormbreakers are a faithless lot – proper sellswords one and all. But they have been contracted for less than a year, and they only number two thousand men. Our Queen has scattered them across our forces as finely as scum on the ocean crests. They will mount no coups." The tone of his voice was frigid iron.

Gendry frowned, "And the others?" He tapped his foot impatiently, waiting for the man to answer. "Well?"

"The others are not true sellswords. First and foremost they hold their allegiance to their home. The North." Manderly said, "Some are seconds sons, some were refugees of the War of the Five Kings, or that of the Two Queens, and some were simply after coin. Some, like many in the Company of the Rose, are descendents of those who exiled themselves in disgust after Torrhen Stark bent the knee. All have returned home."

Something in Manderly's tone struck Gendry as false. "Northerners? Torrhen Stark bent the knee centuries ago. You still count them as Northerners?"

Manderly clicked his tongue. "They will only accept Northerners into their ranks. They still follow the Old Gods, still speak Common, and they still hold that the only throne they will ever bow to is a Stark's. They came eight years ago, kneeling so deep before Sansa that their heads touched the stone beneath them. They have served our Queen loyally since, extending her reach to Braavos and beyond."

Gendry swore quietly, air hissing between his teeth. "I don't like this, Manderly," he admitted, "Not one bit. Surely you can see why."

"Aye," Manderly replied, fidgeting with the hilt of his sword, although Gendry doubted if it had ever been drawn. The old man looked shifty, halting. "We are walking on the edge of a dagger, Baratheon. I can assure you, the Queen and I agree this is the best way."

_The Queen and I. _Gendry wondered how many decisions in the North had been made on that sentence. Sansa, ruling the North's head and its heart, and Manderly acting as its body.

The situation still reeked of disaster, but Gendry would be lying to himself if he didn't admit something about it interested him.

"If both you and Queen Sansa have put your faith in them, maybe I should too."

Manderly gave an amused snort, "And they told me weren't a politician!"

"Oh aye," Gendry laughed, "I'm actually the craftiest of the lot." As he said that, there was a lurch in the ship, and Gendry realised they had met land.

It took a shorter time than Gendry had expected, but soon the Manderly and his litter were ashore, walking with Gendry parallel to the water. It felt slightly strange, as Gendry was technically walking next to the silent litter-bearers and talking up at Manderly, but he tried to ignore that.

"So what can you tell me about these new ships?" Gendry asked, feet crunching on the shore's rough gravel.

Manderly directed them to the nearest one, the workers stopping as they approached.

"Take a look for yourself," he encouraged.

Gendry walked slowly up to the looming skeleton of the ship, towering seemingly as high as a fort. He brushed his hand over the frame, the grain of the wood smooth to touch. Gendry frowned, and turned to Manderly, "What have you done to the planks? I've never seen shipbuilding such as this."

Lord Manderly smiled, "Aye, it's a new design. We mixed ship styles from Westeros with those of Essos and Northoss. We build the frame first, and then slot in the planks. Then we bind them so they sit tightly edge-to-edge, rather than overlapping each other. Makes for a stronger hull and a larger ship overall, it will have a better chance of fending off those underwater hull-crackers the Essosi use with abandon."

Gendry came to a stop at the end of the boat, staring, "And that?"

"It's a rudder." Manderly called out proudly, "It helps guide the ship. That, combined with more room and more masts for sails, and we won't have to rely so much on the manpower behind the oars like you would with a galley. Also, the height difference should allow us an easy advantage when it comes to the crossbows."

Gendry returned to Manderly's side, brows worried. "And if there is no wind?" He hesitated, "With so few oars these things would be almost dead in the water."

Lord Manderly grimaced, "That is a risk, unfortunately. It's why we've split half the construction between these sailing ships and the longships. Speed and manoeuvrability with the longships, sheer bulk and power with the sailing ships. We just need the tactics to incorporate them."

Gendry rolled back on the edge of his heels, mind reeling with possibilities. "If we pull this off, Manderly, it will change the way naval warfare is done."

"I'm counting on it," Manderly beamed.

"And what would be expected of me?" Gendry asked, feeling almost eager, "If I was to accept Sansa's...offer?"

Manderly's thin lips tweaked, "To create order where there is none. Many soldiers are men and women from the Western fleet. They're used to the leadership of Arya Stark, and they balk at ours." At that, Gendry gave a reluctant grin. He would expect nothing but the best bull-headedness from someone who had followed Arya willingly.

Himself included.

"Some," Manderly continued, "are from a mishmash of Northern houses that could spare the men, although not a-one of them have ever fought aboard a ship. The rest are sellswords, and so too have difficultly following orders when not from their own captains."

Gendry tapped his leg, jittery. It sounded like it absolute, glorious chaos. "How did you do it until now?"

"Many of these men have only arrived in the last few months. My dear granddaughter, Wylla of the Hornwood, has done a thorough job with provisioning the camp and with setting up a chain of supplies, but she has little experience in naval warfare or military specifics, and she is desperately needed back to command Hornwood's defences."

"You've taken years to prepare and build this fleet, but you didn't think to train someone to lead it?"

Judging by the abrupt red Manderly was turning, Gendry had said something wrong.

"Oh, aye, we had the men alright," Manderly whispered. "My son and heir, Wylis, was to command the fleet. He had all the knowledge, enough experience, and capable commanders. And then half of them went and died in the plague, including my son."

Gendry winced. He had been in Storm's End at the time, and thank the Mother, the plague had never touched his people. That hadn't been the case for the North.

"My apologies, Lord Manderly. I had forgotten."

Manderly harrumphed, but replied gently, "I know it is a difficult thing we are asking of you, Gendry Baratheon. It will be an uphill battle to gain the respect of your soldiers, and the North are not a naval people – we haven't been since Brandon the Burner. One decade is not enough to change that. Queen Sansa has sent you here for a reason, something she believes only you are capable of doing."

Gendry searched the harbour, taking in every ship and every soldier. There was no structure, only purpose and potential. A potential he was allowed to smith and to weld to however he willed it.

There had never been any real doubt on Gendry's part. No matter how annoyed he was with the situation and with Sansa, it was Gendry himself that had chosen this path the moment he had come to the North. The moment he had sworn his loyalty to Sansa. He would own to it.

He would _make _himself own to it.

Still, his heart drummed in his chest so quickly he had to catch his breath. He grinned at Manderly.

* * *

A/N: Sorry for the info dump. The 'new' style of ships are basically galleons (thank you AoE II). Also, I had a lot of trouble getting the naval jargon for this chapter. GRRM doesn't go into a great amount of detail about military ranking, so until further notice everyone is either a commander or a captain. Thank you for coming to this TED talk.

Within the tv series, Gendry is never really seen as having ambitions. You get the sense he is insecure about his status with Arya, wants somewhere to belong, and is good at his work, but never really anything beyond that. Things happen emto/em him, rather than him making things happen.

I've tried my best to incorporate that, and Gendry's core character in this is very go-with-the-flow, hence a large part of his personality being reactionary rather than causal. The few exceptions are when he does something impulsive, or when his situation forces him to be otherwise. Is he stupid? No. Occasionally oblivious and single-minded? Maybe. Often he doesn't realise the impact he has on others, especially the positive ones, because that insecurity still runs deep. It's defs interesting to try and write.


	9. Summer Winds

He didn't know how he was supposed to lead a whole navy when he apparently couldn't even get himself out of bed. It was still dark outside, and through groggy eyes he saw the first glow of the sun as it crawled above the horizon. Such a pretty orange.

He felt himself drifting, the siren call of sleep too enticing. _No_. His eyes snapped open and pinched his arm with all the force he had. _Ow, ow_.

"Get up, you lazy idiot," he hissed at himself.

Gendry took a deep breath and dragged himself out of bed. Still half asleep, he fumbled in the dark to put his leathers on before the Northern chill set. At one point he even banged his head against some sort of cupboard or rather, and cursed loudly.

_I have no idea why I'm doing this_, he though as he collected his warhammer and sword as he made his way down to the training yard.

But he did know. Between the years spent on the Small Council and the constant travel, Gendry had fallen out of regular weapons practice. It was a stroke of luck and a testament to his natural ability with a blade as well as muscle from hours still spent in a forge that he didn't get himself killed in the Westerlands. He didn't want to take that chance again.

And, he realised with a pang of guilt, he had gotten downright lazy. Once upon a time he would have had to be awake and ready every day at dawn, as did most of the smallfolk. Case in point – already the servants were darting between corridors, hands full of washing or flour or cleaning rags, the smell of fresh bread somehow managing to pervade every nook and cranny.

He could hear and smell the yard before he could see it, the rusty smell of sweat and the clang of blunt iron practice swords belling in his ears. He rounded the corner and grimaced. The yard itself was already crowded, with maybe forty members of the guard kicking up dust as they fought in groups, with more circling the yard in dogged lopes.

"Fifty more!" Came a bellow that near pierced his ears, and the guards dropped to the ground again, pushing against the dirt.

"Seven hells." He looked around for the source of the noise and found the unimpressed Captain Moyra bearing down on him. Hastily he took a step back, then another. Maybe she hadn't seen him, and she was stalking some other unfortunate. Maybe it wasn't too late to get out of this nightmare.

But of course, Gendry had no such luck.

"Are you lost, Commander?" She cocked her chin up and pursed her thin lips.

"No?"

"You sound unsure."

"I'm not." He was.

She seemed unconvinced.

"Then is there something I can help you with?"

Gendry steadied his shoulders and tried to look a slight more enthusiastic. "I'm hoping to get in some practice before I am to meet Lord Manderly for breakfast, and was wondering if I may train here with you and yours?"

The captain stared at him for a while. Then she sighed and shook her head. "Seven help me. _Fine_. But don't lag behind."

Gendry thanked her, giving an awkward half-grin, and rubbed sleep out of his eyes with one hand as he trailed behind her, hoping to all the hells that he wasn't too much out of shape.

* * *

In the end, his suspicion was right. He thought this ruefully as he laid flat on his back, heart racing and resisting another urge to heave, covered in a thick layer of sweat and dirt. He rubbed his hands together, noting with disinterest that it had the same consistency as mud.

He had just thoroughly embarrassed himself in front of all these men and women, managing less laps of the yard by a third compared to the rest of them, and less than half the exercises, before choking up whatever remained from last night's supper.

"May I make a suggestion, Lord Baratheon?" Captain Moyra asked from some distant point above him.

Gendry grunted his consent. Heaviness had settled into his bones at this point. Surely no one would mind if he closed his eyes, just for a few moments.

"Go to the smithy with your leathers and tell them to weight it. Also ask them for a blunted iron blade weighted with lead. "

Gendry cracked one stinging eyelid to glare at her. "Surely I just heard you wrong."

"You didn't." She sounded almost amused, the sadistic old crone.

"Then _fuck no_."

There was a gruff laugh. "I don't think I truly believed you were Flea Bottom stock till just now. Did you know you get an accent when you swear?"

Gendry grunted. Yes, he did. Tyrion and Pod had pointed it out on more than one occasion. Normally he would be self-conscious enough to make an extra effort to speak like he had a longer stick up his arse, but right now he couldn't really muster the strength to care.

But the captain let his silence slide off her like water. "So, Baratheon. Weights. By tomorrow. And you'll join afternoon practice as well. That is, if you are made of studier stuff than most nobles. I'm still in two minds."

She was taunting him, plain and simple. But luckily Gendry was above such petty challenges and cock-measuring contests...mostly.

Rather than answer, he asked instead, "And how exactly will that help, aside from making my bones creak more than they already do? I'm getting older, you know."

Of course, he already had an idea what the answer would be. After all, he had been perfecting how to kill people for a very long time. With a sigh, he pushed himself up and onto his feet, giving a half-hearted attempt to beat the dirt from his clothes, which clung to him like a second skin.

But she gave no more than an arch look to his stupid question. "Add more weights when you find your exercises getting too easy. Keep doing this until I say so. If I can do it at fifty namedays, then you shouldn't have a problem, so don't whinge."

Gendry gathered just enough effort to be offended. Whinge? He never whinged.

But _Seven_. This would hurt. He would hurt, and he would be sore and exhausted most days. Although between that and getting slaughtered in battle, the choice was an easy one.

"I guess I'll see you this afternoon then," Gendry said as he turned to leave, limping and still struggling against his tumultuous stomach, feeling more than a little strange.

He cheered slightly when – although he might have mistaken it – he got another smile out of the captain.

* * *

He took a detour to the smithy before returning to his chambers to bathe. He almost thought better of it, but the idea turning up empty handed to the yard tomorrow irritated him.

Besides, he wouldn't allow the captain to be proven right. Guess he was joining the cock-measuring contest after all.

Gendry felt shaky as he climbed the stairs, limbs weak and loose. He didn't remember training ever being this bad afterwards, but he shook it off. Jaime Lannister had been over thirty-four when he was still in his fighting prime, so too now was Brienne of Tarth. He could do this.

As he approached his chambers, he found there was a youth maybe no more than seventeen namedays pacing at the door, fine clothes stitched with the Manderly sigil. His brown eyes widened under long strands of hair when they alighted on Gendry.

He looked like one of those long-eared rabbits that were fashionable for the highborn children in King's Landing to keep in baskets. Ridiculous.

"My Lord!" he cried and rushed forward. He looked so happy that Gendry's hand fell to his hilt. "I've been searching for you everywhere!"

"You have?" Gendry blinked.

"Yes," the boy nodded with eagerness. "I've been sent to tell you Lord Manderly requests your presence at breakfast in his outer chambers."

Gendry felt a small spur of pleasure. It felt good being included. Wanted.

"When?

The boy shifted stance awkwardly. "Well... a half hour ago, my Lord."

Gendry's face dropped.

* * *

By the time Gendry had hurriedly bathed with a washcloth and cold water in a basin and dressed, the bell had tolled again to mark the hour. He had dressed himself in one of his more decent sets of breeches, and a loose beige tunic embroidered at the edges with the Baratheon stag.

He was led through several sets of chambers by the overenthusiastic boy from before, whose name Gendry still hadn't learned. Finally they reached a door, two guards stepping aside to let them through. The clink of cutlery and the waft of pie crusts and cooked bacon greeted him.

The boy bowed to him quickly from the threshold. "Good day, my Lord." With haste he left.

"Ah! Gendry!" Manderly cried out, seemingly unhindered by a full mouth. "Come meet my family!"

It was a small table, and far more intimate then Gendry had expected. There were two boisterous children no older than seven, a tiny blonde woman who had just stopped scolding them to stare at Gendry. Finally there was Manderly himself, absorbed by what Gendry assumed was one of his infamous lamprey pies.

"Can you get a move on, friend? You're blocking the doorway," a voice came from behind him.

He jumped and turned around to a grinning, also tiny, woman with bright green hair, outfitted in plate armour washed white and holding a helm painted orange. It was the most bizarre outfit Gendry had ever seen.

"Well, are you moving or not, Stag?"

Gendry frowned, and took a step to the left.

"Ah, Wylla. Come bring poor Gendry to the table, he must be starving."

Oddly enough, he wasn't. The thought of food was actually making him feel a little sick. He turned his attention back to the woman. Beautiful, but strange. This must be Manderly's other granddaughter, the one who had been organising supply routes for the navy and the camps. The one who had married the legitimised bastard of House Hornwood.

Though she was as fragile looking as her sister, a vice-like arm shot out to grab his, and he was promptly dragged to the table and seated across from Manderly and next to Wylla.

Manderly stared down delightedly at him. "Gendry, this are my granddaughters, Lady Wynafryd and Lady Wylla. Wynafryd's husband, Desmond Locke, is the one whose position you are filling. These are their children, Wylisa and Denyl." The two small children chirped at him, and Gendry smiled.

He didn't mind children, but he never knew what to say to them. "It's a pleasure to meet all of you," he said, settling for safe and bland.

Introductions done, Gendry spent the next half hour idly pushing food around on his plate and listening to Northern gossip.

"Well, I heard old Ryswell is furious because his youngest daughter made off with a Northossi sailor. She jumped on the _Nymeria_ and didn't look back!"

Gendry made the appropriate outrageous gasp, and laughed as he wondered what Arya would think of her prize ship being made use of as a vessel for elopement and scandal.

She would love it. He had no doubt. Probably would boast about it, in fact.

"I heard they're taller than Skaggs!" Little Denyl cried.

"And that their skin is as brown as the earth and they have red eyes!" His sister joined in. They both looked at Gendry expectantly, as if his status as an outsider held all the questions of the heavens and below.

Gendry gave a small laugh and shook his head. "I wouldn't know, I've never seen a Northossi man or woman."

The children muttered among themselves, disappointed. Soon a nursemaid ushered them off for their daily writing lessons with a septon. Gendry was always a little mystified at the strange upbringing highborn children had. He himself had spent his childhood stealing pasties and running through Flea Bottom barefooted and carefree alongside the other children of whores and dock-workers.

Wylla's voice rose sharply. "Well you're all _never_ going to believe what I heard from some Free Folk traders this morning in the Inner Docks."

She had the smug look of a cat who had taken all the cream, and then some. Moments spanned on.

"Seven hells. Just spit it out, Wyl," Wynafryd growled. Gendry agreed wholeheartedly.

Wylla's grin grew wider. "It seems our dearest King Jon has had his wicked way with yet another Wildling, because now he has a son. A bastard for the former Bastard of Winterfell. "

Gendry choked on his ale, hacking up the offending liquid. Jon had a _what? _Around him Manderly and Wynafryd hissed their disbelief.

"Can you be certain?" Manderly asked intently. The quiet is deafening.

"Yes, Grandfather," Wylla said with a small smile. "It's all they could joke about, of how their king has finally given up his maidenly Southron virtues."

Gendry leaned in closer, resting on his elbows. He thought it would have been a cold day in the hells before Jon ever had a bastard. But then, it has been ten years since Gendry last saw him.

Wylla then hesitated, and her expression sobers. "Grandfather, there is one thing...they're calling the babe kissed by ice."

Manderly frowns. "What does that even mean?"

Wylla clasped her hands. "From what I gathered, the babe is less than a year old, but already he has a mop of silver hair and his eyes have settled as violet as Daenerys Targaryen's. The boy is a dragon."

Silence engulfed them again.

It was difficult for Gendry to process, the idea of Jon Snow with a son. But then, it was difficult for Gendry to process when he had heard that the brooding former King of the North had disobeyed orders and fled North to rule over the Free Folk as King.

Gendry may not know how to think about it, but he did hope Jon was happy. He also hoped the babe was of a sunnier personality. Gods knew that Westeros didn't need yet another sulking Stark.

"Who knows," Manderly said finally. "It may be nothing to worry about." But still he sounded troubled.

* * *

Eventually conversation started back up again and drifted away from gossip, ending in Manderly and his two meddling granddaughters planning out his new life.

"Of course, you will have your own office for correspondence, councils, and whatnot. We've assigned Garrick Overton as your secretary and errand runner for the time being. The boy is on the road to becoming a septon and the boy's father insisted quite strongly. I'm assuming you liked him. You haven't sent him away yet, and the boy can be a little...overenthusiastic."

"I'm sorry, who?" The name didn't sound familiar.

Wynafryd stared at him. "The boy who brought you. Garrick Overton, a son of House Overton, former vassals to House Bolton."

Gendry winced. "Yes, he will do fine," he replied weakly. While he was glad to be able to put a face to a name, he could have gone without that additional piece of information. If he hadn't already met the boy, he might have been inclined to dislike him.

"And of course," Manderly carried on, "there are multiple youths from good families that would make excellent candidates for a squire. Although I can recommend –"

Something cold slithered into Gendry's gut. "No."

"Pardon me?"

"No."

Manderly spluttered. "You need help with your armour. Do you expect to be able to get into it yourself?"

"I'll ask one of the men. I will not be responsible for sending a green boy who has no experience wielding a proper blade into battle." He could feel his voice lower, become rougher the longer he talked.

Manderly drew back, seeming shocked that such a simple thing could draw such an impassioned response. "Well they would have _some _experience."

Gendry maintained a stony silence. Finally Manderly gave way, raising his hands in mock surrender.

The bells rang out again, sounding mid-morning. Gendry clicked his tongue. Was it already that late in the day?

Wylla begged leave, and Manderly excused them all, but not before called out to Gendry.

"Yes?"

"If you plan on going into the city, please see me or the captain about an escort first. I haven't had time to sit you down and explain properly my reasons, but we'll need to at some point. The matter is important."

"Sounds good to me?" Gendry replied, drawing out the words in puzzlement. Gods only knew what the bastard meant.

With nothing further coming from Manderly, Gendry moved to exit the chambers. Only to find Wynafryd in his way.

"Come," she said. "We have somewhere to be. People you have to meet."

* * *

And he was back to meetings. He sighed. _Again_.

This one so far seemed only just less painful than those he experienced in the Six Kingdoms, but all the introductions were still enough to feel like his ears were about to start bleeding at any given point.

It didn't help that he still physically felt strange and disjointed.

Wynafryd was there to oversee everything with her second and third in command, two men whose names Gendry had forgotten already. He felt a bit guilty, but it wasn't his fault, really. They were just so bland-looking.

The group in front of him, however, was anything but.

"These are the leaders of the Company of the Rose, the Wolf Pack, and the Stormbreakers. You'll have a chance to be introduced to their senior captains later. And, of course, you've already met Lord Brandon Flint of Flint's Fingers."

The loud man he had met at the Banefort grinned widely and yelled at him from the other side of the room. "Good to see you again in one piece, Baratheon!"

"You too, Flint." Gendry laughed. The man certainly seemed more likable when he wasn't assaulting prisoners on Arya's orders. "If I see any more severed hands, at least I'll know who to blame!"

"Excuse y—"

Wynafryd cleared her throat, interrupting Flint's attempt at mock outrage. "He has remained here while Lady Alysane Mormont and Lord Ethan Lake journey south to meet with Lady Meera Reed at Greywater Watch. Captain Edda Poole you will meet on the morn. They are the primary leaders of the Northern forces."

There was a brief pause before she continued. "As for the free companies, the group to the left are the Company of the Rose, led by Lord Brandon Longsnow and his sister, Lady Sarai Longsnow."

Two figures of a similar height stepped in front of him, equally lithe and graceful, reminiscent of some wild predator in snowy forests.

"I haven't heard of many in the free companies with titles." Gendry said in his lightest tone. It was a poor attempt to break the tension, but Gendry's forte had never been conversation.

The goodwill died when Sarai Longsnow's eyes met his, armed with an impossible grey. Taken aback, Gendry glanced over to her brother. His had the same unusual, but familiar colour. What was more, Gendry knew he wasn't mistaking the distain there.

Wynafryd cleared her throat uncomfortably. "I should have mentioned, Gendry, that Lord and Lady Longsnow have only recently been granted their titles at the command of the Queen, as the closest kin of House Stark."

Gendry's brows shot up. A Queen acknowledging an illegitimate line? Not that he could talk, but still, what was Sansa thinking? "I didn't realise her Grace had cousins outside of the North."

"Distant," Brandon said in a deep timbre, chin raised and lids low. "East was where the Starks sent their chaff – the unwanted second sons and bastards." There was a hint of a Free Cities accent beneath the ice in his voice, although as to which city Gendry had little clue.

"The occasional wanton daughter, too," Sarai said coolly, her smile entirely too sharp.

Gendry gave a shallow smile and nodded. He was starting to feel odd, like there was a woollen blanket separating himself and the rest, and there was a strange buzzing sound in his ears. He motioned to one of the serving boys at the side of this table, "Water, please."

After receiving the clay cup, he took a long draught. Still his head buzzed. He would just have to try his best to ignore it. Gendry turned back to find them watching him, Wynafryd looking annoyed, and he didn't care to interpret the others expressions.

He wasn't off to a good start.

"Yes...well," Wynafryd said, "Best move on." She gestured to the two men in the middle, "May I present Ronnard Hornwood, Captain-General of the Wolf Pack, and his son, Captain Ronnel Hornwood."

Gendry cursed silently. It was like they were _begging_ for Gendry to mix up their names.

A pale, leather-faced man of average height and his reedy, pimpled youth of a son approached, and with alarm Gendry realised they weren't stopping. Ronnard strode forward with a confident grin until he captured Gendry's hand with his own.

There was no escape.

"It's a great honour to be introduced, Lord Baratheon. I have an old friend from Greenstone that fought for you in the Stormlander Rebellion in 308, he says you were a bloodthirsty beast. I for one cannot wait to see your fighting first-hand."

Yes, well first the man would actually have to let go of Gendry's hand.

"I fought with many good men then, and I look forward to fighting with you," Gendry replied, pasting a fake smile onto his face while his gut roiled. The man was being friendly, and Gendry couldn't afford to waste whatever friendliness he had.

Out of the corner of his eye, Gendry could feel another person approach.

"Ah," Wynafryd said, "and this is Captain Thom Tully of the Stormbreakers, and his second, Lieutenant Rolph... Frey."

Brandon Flint hissed something under his breath, and Wynafryd shot him a sharp look that promised death and destruction.

Turning to his left, Gendry saw a small, olive-skinned man with red hair, next to a taller, but predictably more weasel-faced one. Seven. Another Frey. Where in the blasted hells were they coming from?

"It is _Ser_ Thom, if you will," said the man, violet eyes set above wormy lips. Rolph Frey rolled his eyes behind his commander's back.

"A pleasure," Gendry replied, before saying with caution, "It isn't a common thing to see Tullys and Freys making allies of one another."

"We are not our highborn relations. Not by at least a hundred years," Rolph said shortly, his face hard.

"But," Thom Tully interrupted with a pointed, pinched look at his second-in-command, "let it also be said that nobility stays with the bloodline. For instance, my dearest cousin, Sansa, recognised our kindred spirit when we met. She embraced me as if I were one of her long dead brothers, although truth be told I believe she sees dearest cousin Robb when she looks at me. "

There was a long, shocked pause. Gendry blinked, as if somehow that would erase the sheer idiocy of the man in front of him.

The slain Starks were a sore point for the North even all these years later. One only had to look at the murderous faces of Brandon Flint and Wynafryd to see. Even the servants and guards were sneering, hands grasping their trays and tridents till their hands went white.

"That's not what I heard," Ronnard or Ronnel said slyly, breaking the tension. "I heard you made a right fool of yourself when you met Her Grace, and that she sent you away within a day."

"_That's a lie_." The response was a little too quick and certain.

There was a heavy sigh to Gendry's right. "I guess not everyone can have our fortune with family connections, sister." Brandon said pensively, dark bronze hand stroking his salt-and-pepper beard, as if he were making a comment in the privacy of his chambers. "Maybe we should ask our dear cousin if she can also give Goodman Tully here some land."

"_You will address me as _Ser, you cock-sucking Myrish bastard."

Gendry's mouth fell open. Brandon Flint starting laughing at Tully with not so much as even an attempt to hide it, and with a downright malicious edge.

"I think the little Lyseni likes you, Bran," Sarai said drolly to her brother, watching in a predatory manner as Thom Tully got so purple in the face that the colour almost matched his eyes.

The throbbing in Gendry's head increased and he swallowed roughly. "Right," he jumped in quickly, "I think I have heard enough." All faces turned toward him. Gods it was like he was right back where he was several months ago, brokering decades-old grudges and blood feuds at Lannisport.

Only this time he felt unbalanced. The words couldn't come quickly to his mouth and he so, so tired. It felt as if something was coming to a breaking point.

Evidently he took too long, because Wynafryd frowned at him and addressed the group in his stead. "You've all been called here today become acquainted with one another and with your commander, who our Queen has appointed to organise our fleet with your aid while my husband has business in Deepwood Motte. We'll wait until the end of the week before discussing plans, and that should be enough time for the rest of the North's –, "

"No offense meant, Lady Manderly," Rolph Frey interrupted, "But shouldn't our...interim navy commander be telling us this, and not your Ladyship, who has domain of White Harbour's land defences?" Cold eyes stared at Gendry over a long and pointed nose, and there was more than one grunt of agreement at the table.

Gendry couldn't help but catch the elder Hornwood's disappointed glance at him, and Gendry felt a spike of shame. No doubt the older man was trying to match this wasted image of Gendry to the inflated stories he'd heard of the Wendwater and Weeping Town, the two deciding battles that closed the Stormlander Rebellion all those years ago.

Battles Gendry had led, and won.

The Rebellion had happened in the years after Bran had ascended, and the stuffy old hacks who had managed to survive or avoid Stannis and Renly's wars had objected to suddenly being ruled by, to quote a popular ditty, "a bastard, a half-man, and a cripple".

It had been a different time, and a different place, and frankly Gendry didn't remember a whole lot. He had given himself to bloodlust, and Gendry rarely had full memories of those periods.

He sighed and shook his head, returning to the present.

This was bad. Gendry hated being thought of as a fool as much as the next person, but on a practical side – being thought of as a weak and pliant leader was dangerous. For...for some reason. His sluggish mind drew a blank, and Gendry found that his hands were clammy. Still he couldn't think of a response.

But he was saved when Brandon Flint stood abruptly, toppling the seat backwards, his teeth bared in a feral snarl. "Listen here, _Frey–_

"What Lord Flint means to say," Wynafryd trampled over his words with no subtlety, "is that this meeting would be better scheduled for another time. At the end of the week, or six days hence?"

Flint glared, seemingly wanting to argue. But – hesitantly – he settled back into his seat, content with casting an evil eye at Rolph Frey. Gendry wished Flint would have just punched him instead.

"I wonder how we're expected to plan anything at all when it seems no one can finish a sentence around here without being interrupted," Sarai Longsnow murmured with spite to her brother, who snorted.

Gendry stared dully around the table, wondering how he could fix this situation. Wynafryd regarded him, and her frown deepened. She took a deep sigh, and gave a short wave to the table. "You're all dismissed. I expect you all back here promptly at three hours past sunrise on the day to cooperate our defences."

Gendry briefly closed his eyes, and focused on breathing deeply. There was a shuffling sound, and Gendry opened his eyes to see them all leaving the room. Relief filled him, and he sunk into the chair.

"Baratheon. What was that?"

"A lapse in judgement," Gendry mumbled.

"A lapse?!"

Yes. It was obviously a lapse by deciding to even get up this morning.

"You looked weak," Wynafryd told him bluntly. "You let your inferiors lead the discussion. Now they'll think they can lead every discussion. That they can lead _you._ I did not think a man of your status and experience would let that be so."

"It was not like that at the Banefort," Brandon told Wynafryd. "He had a fucking iron grip over every Southron man and woman there, and a good deal of the Northern ones, too."

Wynafryd gave a small hum, her expression thoughtful. She turned back to Gendry. "So what happened here?"

"Are you alright, Baratheon?" He heard Flint ask distantly. "You look a little peaky."

"I – ," he opened his mouth to reply, but the buzzing in his ears returned worse than before, his head began to fell hot and his mouth began to water. Gendry frowned. "I –,"

He threw himself to the side with barely enough time to miss the table, and retched onto the wooden floors. Lowered to his knees, the smell of bile filled his nose and he groaned.

Seven hells, this was turning out to be a wonderful day.

"Ah," he heard Wynafryd comment drily from above, "That makes more sense."

* * *

He woke groggily to a familiar, shouting voice.

"Traipsing all around the South and North, from mouth to arse crack and back again, and then you put him through his paces on the first day he settles, _and _with a summer chill in the air. Are you mad?!"

"He seemed fine! No more than any soldier getting into shape after a long absence. Frankly, we need our commander to be competent on the field for morale, my Lord. He is not that by huffing after just a few exercises."

"Frankly? Well, frankly we also need him to not die of fever in the first week, if you so please. I expect you to be more careful next time, Captain."

The brief silence was sullen, before a quiet, "Yes, my Lord."

There was another voice. "Father, he did not appear sick until the last. Now the sellswords, barring maybe Hornwood, think him lily-livered. Likely our soldiers too. It will be hard to reverse those impressions, maybe impossible. They will bite at every order he gives."

There was a heavy sigh. "Well nothing can be done about it at the moment. Let them know he caught an illness and tell Wylla she'll need to stay a little longer."

"Yes, Father," came the reply, then the sound of heavy footsteps retreating. With the tread of each step, Gendry fell further back into sleep.

* * *

When his fever finally broke, Gendry opened his eyes to find that same dusky orange sunrise prying through his windows. Head still cushioned by pillows and his bedding no longer sweat soaked, Gendry took a deep breath in and out, amazed by how rested and energetic he felt.

But slowly, the events of however many days ago came back to him and he felt himself flush red with shame. He should have realised that first day, before the training yard, that something had been wrong. Serves him right for not recognising it sooner.

Still, this was going to be an absolute shit show to fix.

Politeness wouldn't get him anywhere with these people. The more and more he stayed in the North, the more he realised all those years spent polishing his accent and court manners in order to survive the Southron highborn were wasted now. The North didn't appreciate intricate manners and flowery prose, they appreciated strength.

He sighed. If they wanted strength, then strength he could give them. Could teach them. In a move that was decidedly sneaky for him, Gendry hatched the beginnings of a plan.

* * *

**A/N: Annnnnd I'm back. Having just gotten thoroughly pummelled by uni, a needy retail job, and a work experience placement, I'm happy to be finally updating again. I also have crippling intimacy issues with self-imposed deadlines, so to say sorry this chapter is longer than usual.**

**Hopefully this will be the last chapter with a stack of OC introductions. I wanted to avoid too many OCs when I first started this story, but that was just a tad unrealistic seeing as D&D have erased, forgot, or killed off most of the canon characters, and poor Gendry needs friends and NPCs. I couldn't really get by with generic descriptions of "this captain did this, this lord did that". (Btw bonus to anyone who spots the Tamora Pierce reference.)**

**To those who have stuck with me so far, I cannot thank you enough. I promise this will be the last chapter without Arya in some shape or form.**


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